Pietersen set for £2m payday with three-year contract to play in IPL

The unidentified benefactors, with links to one of the eight IPL franchises, want England's best batsman 'at any price' and are prepared to better the £750,000 a year given to Mahendra Singh Dhoni by Chennai in the IPL's inaugural draft.

The offer explains why Pietersen is so keen to go to India, as he confirmed in an exclusive interview with Sportsmail earlier this week.

"I am disappointed and irritated that England players have been stopped going so far," he said. "And I definitely want to go next year."

The ECB were hoping that their proposed deal with Texan billionaire Allen Stanford, which will be confirmed next week, would keep England's players out of the IPL's clutches.

But such are the riches on offer, to Pietersen at least, that they have admitted defeat.

An ECB insider told Sportsmail that the final decision on all centrally-contracted players heading for the IPL will be in the hands of England coach Peter Moores but that, in Pietersen's case, they will not stand in his way.

That means the Hampshire batsman is likely to head to India virtually as soon as England return from their tour of the West Indies at the start of next April and play in the IPL for three weeks to a month before returning to prepare for the World Twenty20 tournament in England. After that will be the small matter of the Ashes.

The ECB are still concerned that they would leave themselves open to considerable criticism should Pietersen, or any other England player, be injured in extra-curricular action before the Australians arrive and will back Moores' judgment should he decide that any individuals must rest ahead of the biggest domestic summer since 2005.

To that end they are hopeful that their bowlers will prefer a rest after the Caribbean tour rather than being blasted to all parts of India in IPL matches.

Privately, the ECB believe only a limited number of England players, like Ian Bell, Ravi Bopara and Luke Wright, will be targeted. Andrew Flintoff would certainly be asked not to go should he be fit and ready to play against the Australians.

A compromise, meanwhile, has been reached between the ECB and Stanford over the use of black bats in the proposed series of five 20-over matches between England and a West Indies All Stars team, starting in Antigua this November, and an annual four-nation tournament at Lord's starting in 2010.

Stanford's hallmark black bats will be allowed in the Antigua matches, which will be deemed unofficial, but not in the Lord's matches, as they have been outlawed in a recent law change introduced by the MCC.

The ECB had lined up the Brit Oval as an alternative venue for the 20-over tournaments, which will be held in September each year, but are confident that Stanford, who fell in love with Lord's when he visited the home of cricket last month, is prepared to compromise.