Ambati Rayudu pulls out of Texas Super Kings squad as BCCI mulls "cooling off" period for retired cricketers

Ambati Rayudu has pulled out of the Major League Cricket team Texas Super Kings (TSK)'s squad for its first season due to "personal reasons".

The move comes soon after reports suggested that the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) will soon introduce a "cooling-off" period to prevent cricketers from joining T20 leagues immediately after retirement. The middle-order batter announced his retirement on May 28 and joined TSK on June 15.

"Ambati Rayudu will not be available to participate in the first season of the MLC with Texas Super Kings due to personal reasons," TSK, which is the sister franchise of Chennai Super Kings, Rayudu's last team in the IPL, said in a statement.

"He will continue to cheer for the team from India," the franchise added.

Earlier in the day, BCCI secretary Jay Shah after the board's Apex Council meeting in Mumbai, said the board will come out with a policy to prevent "pre-determined" retirements of cricketers. Like the CSK star, a few players in the past joined a foreign T20 league soon after retiring from international cricket or the IPL.

“We’ll come out with a policy to prevent the trend of pre-determined retirement. The office bearers will make a policy and send it back for approval,” Shah said.

According to The Indian Express, this said policy is likely to be a cooling-off period where the players can't join a foreign private league until they have spent a certain time since retiring.

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Questions on the cooling-off period policy after Ambati Rayudu's pull-out

The report of the policy has seen initial criticism from observers. Many believe this is harsh and discriminatory (and perhaps illegal) on many cricketers, who deserve a chance to earn a living after international retirement.

It will be interesting to see how this will work out as well because retirement isn't anything 'official'. Many cricketers, including Rayudu, Moeen Ali and most recently, Tamim Iqbal have announced retirements and then come out of it to play again.

So the question would arise, whether the BCCI would stop players from coming out of retirement and whether they even have any legal rights to do so.