Somerset needed their strongest possible team to get to the CLT20 qualifiers. Unfortunately for them, the team that plays in the competition won’t be it. A fixtures clash with a meaningless international series will rob them of the type of players who could set the Champion’s League alight, and potentially deny Somerset a realistic chance of a money-spinning victory.

The Somerset squad for the CLT20 qualifiers to be played in India on 14 and 15th September has been announced, and almost half the team that got them to the finals are not on the team sheet.

Their four current-superstar and superstar-in-waiting names are not available for a host of reasons:Trescothick doesn’t travel abroad for health reasons; Pollard is cup tied having already been selected for Mumbai; Keiswetter and the new darling of Taunton, Buttler, have the great honour of being selected to play for their country.

Well, it should be a great honour. And if you ever ask a player who has pulled on a shirt for their country they’ll dutifully trot out the appropriate platitudes.

But the England match in question is relatively inconsequential – against the West Indies in a T20 series of two matches. A two match series against any country in any format – T20, 50 overs or Test – is as hollow and unsatisfying as a century scored against declaration bowlers doing impressions of Bob Willis’ bowling action. Neither side will come out of it with any sense of knowledge about themselves as a side, nor will they be able to celebrate with Freddie-like reckless abandon a series win, nor throw out babies with bath water should they lose.

So the club versus country debate faces off for a familiar piece of argy-bargy.

In the UK, the Champion’s League isn’t held in especially high esteem. Perhaps because no county side has yet to fare especially well in it. Australian side the New South Wales Blues won the first final, and Indian juggernaut the Chennai Super Kings did the double by winning the T20CL and the IPL in 2010.

Even with the involvement of English teams, the UK press is reticent about featuring the Champion’s League. Not quite proper, it seems to feel.

Clearly the suits managing cricket don’t hold it in great regard either.  To host a two match series against the eighth ranked international team in the world at the same time, and so denying clubs of their best players is a move that seems insensitive at best, and a malicious restraint of trade at worst.

But the competition has the potential to be as influential as its footballing equivalent: Huge global audience, wide broadcast footprint and unimaginable commercial value to the winners.  It should be regarded as a flag bearer for cricket, capable of reaching new audiences in new territories around the world.

It wouldn’t be fair to ask the players which they’d rather play in. Exposure to the giant Indian market, and the power brokers who own the IPL franchises, gives an opportunity for these players to make their fortunes.

Become overnight millionaires or watch the rain fall on a dank evening in England’s early autumn, with a one day cap as a prize? This is an unnecessary question to ask. The suits should do the right thing and change their scheduling, so at the very least let the young players shine in both.