The Mulgrave Cricket Club, who play in Melbourne’s Eastern Cricket Association (ECA) third-tier competition, said they are very close to striking a deal with former India all-rounder Yuvraj Singh, West Indian Chris Gayle, and South Africa great AB de Villiers.
Mulgrave president Milan Pullenayegam said talks are on with West Indies legend Brian Lara.
“We’ve secured Dilshan, we’ve secured Sanath, we’ve secured Tharanga. And now we are working on finalizing agreements with a few other potential players,” Pullenayegam told ‘cricket.com.au’.
“We are in negotiations, and with Chris (Gayle) and Yuvraj we are nearly 85 to 90 per cent there. We need to finalise a few things but it looks really good.”
The two cricketers are, however, yet to comment on the negotiation.
The ECA’s T20 Cup will feature 3 preliminary matches before a knock-out phase of up to three more games between November and February.
The president added the club is trying to rope in more sponsors to sign the big stars.
“We’ve got a good backing at the moment that will get us across the line, but we don’t want to be just breaking even on it, we want to be able to give back the community and expand the structure of the club,” he said.
“It’s a process, with these big-name players there’s a lot of things we need to incorporate into their visits to Australia: we’ll provide them with accommodation, their travel, food etcetera, there is a lot of background stuff we need to organise for them.”While here we want to put them in contact with our sponsors and see if they can give something back to the club and sponsors. So it’s all part of the negotiations and chats we are having with them,” he added.
