Ken Schofield’s committee of former Test cricketers meets in London today to discuss their inquiry into England’s failure in the recent Ashes series. They will make proposals for, among other things, a system that will provide England with the best chance of regaining the Ashes in 2009.

In the light of recent announcements from Yorkshire that they intend to register Jacques Rudolph, the South Africa Test batsman, as a Kolpak player and from Sussex that Saqlain Mushtaq is to become the third Pakistan Test cricketer on their staff, Schofield and his advisers can hardly ignore the unbridled pragmatism of the counties.

“We are in the process of fulfilling all the conditions and making sure that Jacques is registered,” Stuart Regan, the Yorkshire chief executive, said. Regan is expected to announce soon that Darren Gough will return to the county as captain.

A successor to David Byas as coach will also be named from a shortlist that includes Allan Donald, the former South Africa fast bowler.

As a Test player only last August, Rudolph’s registration for the coming season would be a breach of the rule that no one can play, other than as an official “overseas” player, for 12 months after his last international match or if he has played in first-class cricket in another country in the previous winter. Yesterday, Regan repeated his claim that the rule is unenforceable in law.

“There are plenty of precedents,” he said. “Paul Harris signed for Warwickshire last season but has since played Test cricket for South Africa; Ryan McClaren is registered for Kent but has been playing first-class domestic cricket in South Africa and Martin van Jaarsveld has flouted the rules in the same way. Rudolph has given us his word in writing that he will not play in South African domestic cricket, or any international cricket for them, for three years.”

Schofield’s team cannot claim that this is a matter beyond the brief they have been given by the ECB. The system that supplies England players has to be pertinent to the well-being of the national team.

David Collier, the ECB chief executive, reports that no application from Yorkshire to register Rudolph has been received. He has written to the county to remind them of the conditions that must be fulfilled before a player from overseas can qualify.

Saqlain, who has a British wife, has signed for Sussex for two years, despite the presence on their staff of Ollie Rayner, a promising off spinner from Eastbourne. It is a dubious argument that he will learn more by watching Saqlain than playing in the team.

Sussex already have one Kolpak player flying a flag of convenience in Murray Goodwin, once of Zimbabwe and, by adoption, Australia. Like Saqlain, he will soon be an England-qualified player, in common with Andy Flower, Stuart Law and other former Test players from overseas. The truth that no one seems brave enough to admit is that the England selectors would, quite rightly, never pick them.

Goodwin, Saqlain, Lance Klusener at Northamptonshire and Ian Harvey at Derbyshire have made a commitment to renounce their past and pledge their future to England, but Andrew Symonds, now an Australia all-rounder, once made a similar vow to make English cricket his priority. He did so to play county cricket, though the disingenuousness was less on his part than his county’s.

The general impression one gets is that the ECB is weary of fighting the agents who tout these big-name overseas players, in the belief that they would lose any court case at great expense.

If the Rudolph case is pushed by Yorkshire, however, the ECB should overcome its fear and take on the agents. A reasonable judge should allow a national sport to defend its best interests.

Paradoxically, Regan is equally suspicious of the role of agents, engaged as he is in a battle to oblige Anthony McGrath, the former Yorkshire captain, to stick to his contract and to play for his native county for the next three seasons. The case will be heard by an independent mediator at Lord’s on Friday and if that process fails it would go to an arbitrator.

“Agents in cricket are starting to become much more active,” Regan said. “There is a strong danger that players are being taken down routes that are against their own best interests by agents whose motivation is to take a share of the proceeds.”

McGrath’s representative is athletes1, run by David Ligertwood, the Australian-bred former county cricketer who has introduced the majority of the Kolpak imports. Rudolph is advised by Chubby Chandler’s International Sports Management group, whose cricket manager is Neil Fairbrother, the former Lancashire and England batsman.

In a system of two divisions that encourages cutthroat competition, it is hard to blame the county clubs for trying to get away with it. They have to produce an attractive product for their membership and sponsors, not to mention a team competing for titles.

If centrally contracted players seldom play in the County Championship, however, the insulated national players will lose touch with their roots. Kevin Pietersen has not played a championship match for Hampshire since he became a Test player in 2005. The irony, of course, is that Rudolph intends to follow the very path that Pietersen took to England from South Africa.

Overseas aid

Under present regulations, each county is entitled to register two overseas players, who can be replaced if they are called up for international duty but not because of injury, subject to a maximum of four a season. This will be reduced to one, who could be replaced if he is injured, from 2008, again with a maximum of four a season. Otherwise, players must be from a country within the European Economic Area or a country with an agreement with the EU — so-called Kolpak players — as long as they have not played Test cricket in the previous 12 months.

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