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• Finch and De Kock among first overseas players in Major League Cricket

  Former Australia captain Aaron Finch and ex-South Africa skipper Quinton de Kock are among the first overseas names for Major League Cricket's inaugural season.

  The pair were among six non-domestic players assigned during Sunday's draft at NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.

  Australia duo Marcus Stoinis and Mitchell Marsh, along with South Africa's Anrich Nortje and Sri Lanka's Wanindu Hasaranga were also included as overseas participants.

  Major League Cricket – the first professional T20 league in the United States – will consist of six franchises in its debut year, as cricket looks to build a foothold in the country.

  The ICC are hopeful the sport will be included in the 2028 Olympic Games, to be held in Los Angeles, where one of the half-dozen teams will be based.

  Finch, who retired from T20Is in February, will captain San Francisco Unicorns, where he will be joined by compatriot Stoinis and England's Liam Plunkett, who qualifies as a domestic player through his American wife.

  The pace bowler, who was a member of the successful England team from the 2019 Cricket World Cup, previously played in Minor League Cricket, the developmental league for MLC.

  De Kock is set to play for Seattle Orcas alongside Marsh, while Nortje and Hasaranga will turn out for Washington Freedom.

  The three remaining sides – Texas Super Kings, Los Angeles Knight Riders and MI New York – are yet to add an overseas player, though each drafted nine US-based players on Sunday.

  The tournament will take place over three weeks at Grand Prairie Stadium in Dallas between July 13 and 30.

• Mott: 'Box office' Archer will be back to his best for Ashes and Cricket World Cup

  England white-ball head coach Matthew Mott expects "box office" fast bowler Jofra Archer will be back to his best in time for this year's Ashes and Cricket World Cup.

  Archer returned for England against South Africa in January after spending just under two years out of action with elbow and back problems.

  The 27-year-old managed just one wicket for 81 runs in his first game back but, after being rested for the second ODI, he took 6-40 in the final match of England's 2-1 series loss.

  With five wickets to his name across two appearances on England's tour of Bangladesh, Mott is pleased with Archer's progress but believes there is still more to come.

  "He's a box office player," Mott said. "He's fitted back into the group beautifully and it's an incredible effort for a fast bowler to be out for that long and come back and play as he has.

  "He would admit that he's not fully firing on all cylinders. You can just see he's ticking all the boxes to get back to his best.

  "He just seems to be really slowly, strategically making sure he's doing it right and ticking over and come the Ashes, come the World Cup, I'm sure you'll see him back to his best."

  Wednesday will mark 100 days until the start of England's Ashes series with Australia, while the World Cup gets under way four months later in India.

  Mott was again asked whether Ben Stokes will compete at the World Cup, with the all-rounder recently suggesting he may consider reversing his decision to end his 50-over international career.

  "I'm still in touch with him but the issue about when he wants to play, we don't need to know for a while," Mott said. 

  "The worst thing we could do is try to put pressure on him early to make a decision. We'll just see how his body's holding up and how he's feeling physically and mentally."

• Buttler utilises valuable World Cup planning lesson for England in Bangladesh defeat

  Jos Buttler was unfazed by England's ODI defeat to Bangladesh after a useful lesson for planning ahead of the Cricket World Cup.

  Matthew Mott's tourists had already secured victory in the three-match series and opted for a host of changes in Monday's final ODI in Chattogram, where Bangladesh won by 50 runs.

  Young leg-spinner Rehan Ahmed made his international white-ball debut, while all-rounder Sam Curran was promoted up the batting order as Buttler dropped down to make room.

  England captain Buttler suggested the result mattered for little after seizing an opportunity to evaluate his options on a surface that may be similar to those at the World Cup in India, which starts in October.

  "We changed a few things today and gave an opportunity to people in different ways, but I thought the intensity was still there," Buttler said.

  "We certainly believed we could win the game, and if we played well enough, we would have won the game.

  "But there was an opportunity today to give Rehan a debut, and for Sam to bat at No. 5, and this is the last ODI we play now until September.

  "So, especially in these conditions, it felt like a great chance to gather as much information as we can, and expose people to different situations.

  "If we lost the game, then so be it. But I certainly believed we had a team and a performance that could have won the game today."

  The much-maligned cricket schedule has regularly been a topic of discussion, with the ODI series in Bangladesh a rare chance for England to plan away from the stress of pre-tournament warm-up fixtures.

  England will head to the next global tournament as dual champions, having won the T20 World Cup in Australia last year and the 50-over version in a dramatic victory over New Zealand at Lord's in 2019.

  Buttler reaffirmed confidence in all the moving parts within his England side fitting together when it comes to the next World Cup, as they did at the back end of 2022 in the T20 competition.

  "I think the schedule is hugely challenging to always get your best XI on the field," Buttler said. "But the game has changed a bit [since] the previous cycle of the World Cup.

  "Looking back to the T20 World Cup, we probably went into that World Cup having never played our perceived best XI.

  "But then to get into the tournament and go on to win it, that gives you great confidence that, even though we haven't had the opportunities to always play our best team, international cricket has become [more] focused on the ICC tournaments.

  "I think that's the way we're building towards that. And we know that, come the World Cup, we will have the opportunity to pick from everyone who's available."