Andrew Flintoff fears the Indian Premier League may lose some of its excitement by being moved overseas to South Africa.

The 31-year-old Lancashire all-rounder is one of five centrally-contracted England players who were due to fly out to India for the scheduled IPL start on April 10, for a three-week window negotiated between the England and Wales Cricket Board and the IPL.

"Ideally I'd like to have played in India"

But security fears have forced the IPL organisers to look overseas and despite entering into negotiations with the ECB to stage the tournament in England, they have instead decided to move it to South Africa and start eight days later on April 18.

The decision means Flintoff, Kevin Pietersen, Paul Collingwood, Owais Shah and Ravi Bopara will still be given the opportunity to play Twenty20 cricket with and against the world's leading stars, but they will be denied the chance to do it in the unique atmosphere of India in front of packed crowds.

"Ideally I'd like to have played in India," admitted Flintoff. "It's the Indian Premier League and you have the chance to play in front of those crowds and those venues and it's a special place to play cricket.

"I'm obviously disappointed we're not going there but it's still taking place and if it's South Africa then I'm sure they'll put on a great tournament, but I don't think it will quite the same as if it had been in India."

Each England player was due to be paid on a pro rata basis for the number of games they featured in during the tournament and by compressing this year's event, they may still end up playing in the same number matches.

The new schedule is still being finalised but under the old itinerary, Flintoff could have played six matches for the Chennai Super Kings, Pietersen could have played eight for Bangalore Royal Chargers, Collingwood and Shah were available for seven for the Delhi Daredevils and Bopara could also have played eight for the Kings XI Punjab.

"I'm looking forward to playing"

They are all waiting to discover whether the new schedule reduces their number of matches - and also their pay packets - but at least now they can all begin making plans for South Africa.

Flintoff, who is due to make his first appearance of the one-day series for England in Friday's third match against West Indies at the Kensington Oval after a recent hip problem, is relishing playing in the IPL.

He was sympathetic to England's desire to hold the tournament but understood why South Africa was chosen at that time of year.

"It would have been nice logistically just because I would have been at home, but I think some of them would have had to bring some long-johns with them!" he conceded.

"I'm looking forward to playing in the team we've got. There are several world-class players in there so the opportunity to play with the likes of (Mahendra Singh) Dhoni, (Matthew) Hayden and Murali (Muttiah Muralitharan) again is going to be special.

"But I want to get Friday out of the way first. I just want to get back onto the field and then tackle all the IPL stuff once the series is over."

Although Flintoff faced Collingwood at the start of last season for Lancashire against Durham, dismissing him in the Championship match at Old Trafford last May, in the modern cricket world of central contracts it is not often that England's players face each other in a competitive match.

Flintoff's Chennai side were due to meet the Bangalore Royal Challengers, captained by Pietersen, in Chennai on April 11 under the old schedule.

Flintoff predicted: "It will be interesting.

"There's KP, Colly and Owais and Ravi out there and it will be interesting to see how that turns out, but I'm not lying awake thinking about it."