Hussey wanted to leave CLT20 early

Michael Hussey, an important part of Australia's middle order, has said that he was forced to play in the Champions League Twenty20 right till the end of the tournament, which affected his preparations for the Mohali Test. The Test turned out to be an all-time great match, but Hussey scored only 17 and 28 in a one-wicket Australian defeat.

"Yeah, well I spoke a lot to Cricket Australia about it, but the decision was that their players were going to be available for the Twenty20 campaign so there was nothing I could really do about it," Hussey told AAP.

Hussey and Doug Bollinger, both part of the Chennai Super Kings' victorious campaign in South Africa, joined the squad two days before the Test started in Mohali. Bollinger had to pull out on the last day of the match with an abdominal strain, when he was on fire and Australia needed two wickets to wrap the match up with runs to spare.

Hussey said he would have dropped out of Champions League early if he had the choice. "I just had to grin and bear it really, get here as quick as I possibly could after the final and just prepare as well as I can. I put my case forward, but they'd made their decision and I just had to go along with it really. I'm contracted to Cricket Australia so it's their call.

"I made my mind up that, well, I've just got to get on with it otherwise I'm going to ruin my time with Chennai [Super Kings] and not enjoy the rest of my time in the Champions League, and I'm going to ruin my time with Australia once I get here if I let it affect me.

"So I basically got over it as quick as I could and tried to concentrate on playing as well as I could for Chennai and then try to prepare and play well for Australia."

Hussey wants to express his concerns to CA. "Scheduling is something, from an ACA [Australian Cricketers' Association] perspective, we've been talking about a lot to Cricket Australia, and it's getting harder and harder with more and more cricket being played at all the time," he said. "But certainly when the time is right I will sit down with James Sutherland and Michael Brown and go through how I felt and maybe things we could do better next time."

The clashes with the T20 leagues have been a constant irritant for the Australian team management. Last year, Brett Lee suffered after the Champions League, and in turn Australia suffered in the seven-ODI series in India. Ricky Ponting and Tim Nielsen, like Hussey, have said that there isn't much they can do about it, and have to make do often.