'If players prioritise IPL over playing for country, what can we say': Kapil Dev after India's exit from T20 World Cup

Legendary all-rounder and former World Cup winning Kapil Dev feels the BCCI and Indian cricket should start planning immediately for the next World Cup instead of leaving things for later. The year 2022 will stage the next T20 World Cup and with India not able to qualify for the knockouts this year – the first time it has happened in eight ICC events – Kapil pointed out a couple of reasons which resulted in India's underwhelming performance at the T20 World Cup.

"It's time to look at the future. You should start planning right away. It's not that since the World Cup is over, Indian team's entire cricket is too. Go and plan. I just feel that there should have been some gap between IPL and the World Cup. But this is certainly there that our player today have a lot of exposure but they could not make the most of it," Kapil said on ABP News.

Kapil went on to make a big statement, saying that certain cricketers prefer playing the Indian Premier League and do not give importance to representing the country first, and explained that the BCCI needs to look into it. Although Kapil insisted that he is not against the idea of cricketers playing franchise cricket, the order should be the other way round.

"When players prioritise IPL over playing for the country, what can we say. Players should take pride in playing for their nation. I don't know their financial conditions so can't say much. But I feel that first in line should be the country's team and then franchises. I'm not saying do not play cricket there (for the franchise), but the responsibility is now on the BCCI to plan its cricket better. To not repeat mistakes we committed in this tournament is the biggest learning for us," added Kapil.