Twenty20 Winners Eye £2.5m Jackpot

The Champions League of cricket is no pipedream. It was announced yesterday that a Twenty20 club tournament, which will have a winners' prize of $5m (£2.5m), an astonishing figure by cricketing standards, will take place during a 10-day period in late September and early October, either in India or the Middle East. Dubai is emerging as the likeliest venue.

There will be eight teams, 15 matches and loadsamoney. We already know the identity of six of them. From India there will be Shane Warne's Rajasthan Royals, the IPL winners, and the Chennai Super Kings; from South Africa the Titans (of Pretoria) and KwaZulu Natal Dolphins; from Australia Victoria and Western Australia.

And from England? Well, we don't know yet. But we should do by late afternoon on 11 July, the day when the Twenty20 Cup reaches its climax. The two finalists will qualify for this Champions League bonanza. If the domestic competition here needed a little spicing up this announcement has achieved that at a stroke.

On Wednesday the domestic Twenty20 tournament gets under way and the players will now be desperate for success in this competition ahead of the others. The rewards now on offer for a successful county outstrip what is currently on offer at international level, let alone the Friends Provident, the Championship or the Pro40.

Giles Clarke, the ECB's chairman, said: 'We are extremely grateful to our great friends from Australia, India and South Africa for their hard work and determination to get this tournament off the ground. The Twenty20 Cup will be even more fiercely contested this season in the knowledge that the two teams in the final will have the chance to win five million dollars. I'm sure the demand for tickets for this year's Twenty 20 Cup will be greater than ever.'

There is still some detail to thrash out. It is expected that any players who have represented more than one of the sides who qualify for the Champions League will play for the team from the country of their origin. That will not be an issue this time around. Less clear is the stance on those players who have played in the renegade ICL, so reviled by the Indian board, and who currently play county cricket. Will they or the sides they represent be acceptable?

These announcements will excite England's top players, whose agents must be spinning around with permanent smiles on their faces, even though those international players seldom represent their counties. But there is also the more romantic possibility of the county journeyman finding himself competing for a massive purse in October.

Already, we can sense a change in emphasis among the England players. On Friday they play in a Twenty20 match at Old Trafford and after that there are five 50-over matches against New Zealand. Yet Peter Moores has made all his players available for Wednesday's round of domestic Twenty20 matches.

They all want to turn out for their counties now; there is this Champions League; there are are IPL scouts to impress and so many of our internationals are Twenty20 novices. Alastair Cook, for example, has played only four Twenty20 games - two for England and two for Essex.

This is twice as many as Michael Vaughan, whose two games have been for England. Will Yorkshire permit him to make his county debut this week? I suspect he would like a go.

Just about everyone welcomes the infusion of cash to the game. Apart from the Champions League, there is already the potential for vast riches from Sir Allen Stanford and the Indian leagues.

As ever, money brings with it many questions and the potential for dissension and division. With so much sloshing around, answers will be found rapidly. Meanwhile, the forward defensive is being ripped out of coaching manuals all around the country. There is no money in that.