England players could skip Bangladesh tour

England's players will be allowed to skip the tour of Bangladesh later this year if they have concerns about security in the country, limited-overs captain Eoin Morgan has revealed.

Morgan, Test captain Alastair Cook and team members will meet the England and Wales Cricket Board's security director Reg Dickason on Thursday to discuss the Bangladesh tour, which precedes a five Test tour of India.

An attack in Dhaka last month claimed by the Islamic State group saw 20 hostages killed, including nine Italians, and Australia have cancelled senior and under-19 tours of Bangladesh in the past year.

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"They'll debrief us on the findings on both tours (Bangladesh and India) and we'll chat about it. It has to be quite open," Morgan said in comments reported by British media on Wednesday.

"People have missed tours in the past so you have to make guys feel safe to go. It's a decision you'd rather get out of the way sooner rather than later.

"There's always room for a personal decision. You also have to understand guys might have different priorities."

England are scheduled to play three ODIs and two Tests in Bangladesh in October and November before heading to India.

Bowlers Andy Caddick and Robert Croft pulled out of England's tour of India in 2001 for security reasons, while England forfeited a World Cup match against Zimbabwe in 2003 after refusing to play in Harare.

The three-member ECB security delegation, comprised of Dickason along with head of cricket operations John Carr, and chief executive of the Professional Cricketers Association David Leatherdale recently completed their assessment of security arrangements in Bangladesh.

Australia pulled out of its tour of Bangladesh in October last year, citing security concerns.

But Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland indicated that both nations were eyeing an opportunity to reschedule the Test series in July or September 2017, either side of Bangladesh's scheduled Test and ODI visit to Australia that is likely to be played in the nation's far-north.

"We've had discussions off-line with the Bangladesh Cricket Board," Sutherland said in April.

"They know and understand that we're absolutely committed to playing that (postponed) tour, obviously subject to security matters that we need to go through in preparation for that tour.

"But we're very much looking forward to getting back to Bangladesh and playing cricket over there."

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England assistant coach Paul Farbrace suggested it’d be "huge" decision for players not to tour Bangladesh and said the players had agreed not to speculate about the possibility of opting out of the tour until the ECB’s security assessment was complete.

"We made a group decision as players, coaches and management that we’re not going to talk about it until Reg (Dickason) is back," Farbrace, who was on Sri Lanka’s team bus when it was attacked by terrorists in Lahore in 2009, told reporters earlier this month.

"The idea that players would be allowed to opt out … that’s certainly not something that we’ve talked about. We’ll have to see what Reg comes up with when he comes back.

"We made a group decision as players, coaches and management that we’re not going to talk about it until Reg is back.

"The one thing I will say is it’s a huge decision to decide not to tour a country.

"With Pakistan at the moment, teams not going there, that’s a dreadful shame to see kids not getting to see their heroes play.

"I was on that bus that was attacked in Lahore and two operations later, (I was) lucky to survive that."