Clarke fears gruelling schedule will cut players' careers

Australia's players are concerned about excessive workloads shortening their careers and want more time with their families, according to the vice-captain Michael Clarke. The team, which is preparing for pay negotiations with Cricket Australia, is at the start of a packed 19-month international schedule that could keep them away from home for 11 months.

However, the complaints follow the rush to join the Indian Premier League earlier this year, which cut into the squad's official holiday time. Clarke was not one of the players who took the money in India and currently Australia's programme rules them out of the 2009 and 2010 Twenty20 tournaments.

"The major issue with the players at the moment is because of the amount of cricket going on, and that includes all forms of the game, guys' careers are not going to last as long as they used to," Clarke told Sydney radio 2KY. "That's the worrying factor."

The side is expected to play 26 Tests, 54 ODIs and 27 Twenty20 games between the recent Indian tour and April 2010. Paul Marsh, the Australian Cricketers' Association chief executive, said players like Clarke, who are involved in the three formats, would be away from home for 51 weeks.

"The point is because they are playing so much they don't have as much time to do the off-field obligations as they otherwise would have," he said. "It's not about working less in total because they are going to be working a hell of a lot more on the field than they have in the past."

Clarke will follow the developments over the next couple of years closely and will watch how the tournaments operate while allowing players to represent their countries. "It's going to be interesting to see how contracts work in two years, if you can still get a [Cricket Australia] contract or you're paid per game," he said.

He is also concerned about the time players will have to spend away from their families. "I'll never complain about our job because we're blessed, we're the lucky ones and we have got a fantastic lifestyle, but in the next 15 months the guys will spend 10-11 months without seeing their wives and kids," he said. "If you have a six-month-old baby you don't feel comfortable taking around the world, that's a long time spending away from your wife and son or daughter."