Derbyshire's Head of Cricket Mickey Arthur has accused the ECB of 'disrespecting' county cricket after a number of England stars were made unavailable for the quarter-finals of the T20 Blast.
The first quarter-final took place on Wednesday, with Ollie Pope returning from Test match duty to play for Surrey and David Willey released from the white-ball squad to lead Yorkshire.
However, Chris Jordan, Jason Roy, Sam Curran, Reece Topley, Dawid Malan and Harry Brook were all absent due to their involvement in England's T20 series against India.
Joe Root and Jonny Bairstow were also missing, having been rested ahead of the ODI series against India after their recent Test exploits.
Several other stars are expected to miss Lancashire's quarter-final clash with Essex, including Jos Buttler and Liam Livingstone.
Although Arthur's Derbyshire will not be missing any England players, he believes it is "unacceptable" that so many top stars are unavailable.
And when asked if the Blast's knockout games should be ring-fenced, Arthur replied: "One hundred per cent.
"Surrey-Yorkshire and no international cricketers because there is an England series on at the same time - for me that is unacceptable. It is a showpiece for our players and domestic cricketers of the summer.
"Take The Hundred out of it. This is the showpiece for the counties and to be given so much disrespect for me is not great and I am quite strong on that."
