CA Dumps Vital Cricket.

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Richie

Richie

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Dont expect much cricket outside of the state ODD and Sheffield Shield competitions this season as CA is crying poor mouth over Covid-19 to the tune of $40m. As part of its belt tightening CA is dumping the Second XI competition, CA XI fixtures against touring sides, the National Premier Cricket T20 competition and Australia A tours – such as the one that served as important preparation for Australia's Ashes defense in England last winter – while the best of our next gen will be denied testing themselves against both the Indian and Afghan touring sides. This is one huge kick in the teeth for the players and the cricket loving public of this country.
 
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But they had to do it, CA is in financial trouble. If it wasn't for the Big Bash, they would be broke. Last year Sydney Morning Herald caught them inflating numbers so they could charge more for the broadcast rights. That's called fraud. NSW cricket confirmed their competition is falling over, with U17 players regularly playing grade cricket, not enough players staying in the game for long. Crowd support at test level is falling, Last year SCG barely scraped over 100,000 for their test match, very poor considering over 5 million in Sydney. T20 is the future and that is where the money is going, Even the under age comp is all shorter forms of the game.

In Victoria cricket remains strong with massive increases in participation especially the women up nearly 20 %. Victoria topped the national rankings for registered participation, club cricket participation and indoor cricket participation. Even with this Victoria still has to rely a lot on volunteers. The financial support is not there from CA

NSW John Knox has confirmed his state has "no intention" of making cuts to staff as the national body calls for savings to be made. CA and other states made those cuts. NSW keep wasting the money on their state players and team, on non-essential employees, meanwhile ground roots clubs are suffering. In May 2020 The states agreed to the 25% funding cuts by CA, NSW did not they still want all entitlements. Cricket NSW chairman John Knox has already proved himself one of cricket's most powerful figures when he prompted the resignation of CA chairman David Peever. So obviously NSW cricket is in charge.

"Investment in this area has been dramatically cut in the past month, with Cricket Victoria and Queensland leading the way, after an under-pressure CA said there would be a 25 per cent cut in the distribution states received.
Only NSW – the most powerful of state associations – has so far dug in and refused to enforce any cuts. It revealed on Tuesday it was even hiring a state batting coach."

But what I want to know is if Cricket receives diverse government funding at federal, state and local levels which supports ground roots cricket where is all the money CA gets going? A very select few who rarely play cricket, just a few games a year and are pets of CA, or should I say NSW cricket afterall they're the ones calling the shots, and the fat cats.

So if you are truly a cricket lover, you should be condemning the actions of NSW cricket, because they're the ones wasting money whilst the other states are tightening their belts. That money could have been spent on the Second XI. Other states have reduced staff who are now struggling to put food on the table and rooves overhead, not NSW. The other states are trying to help CA, because there will be reduced revenue this year.
 
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CA says it was starting to bleed back in May .The ACA said CA was fudging the numbers and that was found to be true when the governing body back flipped on its projections that revenue was expected to fall by 48%, from $461 million to $239.7 million, for 2020-21, with a further 20% reduction in 2021-22, from $484 million to $385.5 million. The ACA made peace with CA due to any revenue cuts not impacting the players' immediate retainers and match payments. The CA back flip only became significant once India agreed to tour this summer for four Tests and white-ball matches, adding a cool $300 million to the CA's balance sheet. The embarrassing back flip cost then CEO Kevin Roberts his job. He departed amid much consternation from state associations, the ACA and his own staff after he had asked state associations to take a 25% cut in CA grants – a move resisted by NSW and Queensland at the time..

How did CA manage to get itself into such a financial bind when it had $1.18b to play around with plus whatever else was in its coffers.
 
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Why should the state associations take a 25% cut when a state red ball contracted player earns only about $200-230K. Not bad bickies but small fry when you put that up against a nationally contracted player. If cuts are to be made then they need to come from the pay packets or alternatively, the lurks and perks of our elite cricketers. But the ACA wont have a bar of that so it is a player in state cricket .. the nursery for all Test cricketers.. that cops the financial hit. Them and grass roots cricket. Time the ACA told our elite cricketers to burst their golden bubble and step back into the real world.. at the very least while this damned virus hovers around us.
 
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Last year SCG barely scraped over 100,000 for their test match, very poor considering over 5 million in Sydney.

Did it occur to you that maybe.. just maybe.. the Sydney cricket public preferred to keep their hard earned considering it was a dead rubber after two demolitions of the Black Caps. The Australian cricket watching public are fickle that way. Not me I may add.. as I love watching our baggy greens commit a clean sweep on any nation.. even our Kiwi cuzzies.
 
For me it is a sign of the times, there have been numerous dead rubbers played at SCG and good crowd attendances, but not since the introduction of T20 though. In Australia BBL at The MCG, Adelaide, Perth and Gabba pushes 30,000 regularly, yet apart from The MCG the others don't get those numbers at test matches. Tasmania only get 10,000 but they're not a big state, but NSW struggle to get over 15,000 to a BBL match. Sydney just don't follow cricket like they use to.

There is no draw card in world test cricket. The only side was India who after getting their holy grail last time will be poor this time around, afterall they just were defeated by NZ, because they don't really have a good test cricket side, they just faced some very ordinary bowling last time they were out here.

England are a ODI/T20 side and play test cricket just like an ODI, South Africa have absolutely nothing now, apart from Rabada, WI, Pak and the others have no interest and play accordingly.
 
Other reason for an average 25k per day (4 day match) may have something to do with having to sit out in scorching heat on bloody uncomfortable chairs for seven hours. At an educated guess I'd say half of the SCG 46K capacity is not undercover. I feel for them as my brother and I endured the same at a Test match a year or two back at the iconic but rather archaic ground. We had booked undercover seats but when we arrived we found ourselves in the concourse. Waste of time complaining so we copped it sweet. By days end we both had seriously sore backs and bums.. and even sorer sunburn. Our ear drums were shattered listening to 200 boisterous drunken Richies. So all in all a day from hell.. The only brite spot was an outstanding ton from Matt Renshaw. Oh yeh almost forgot.. it took us well over a hour to get out of the open field car park as the nongs only had one exit for thousands of cars. There were plans for a new underground carpark but the idea got canned.
 
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69er said:
That's Sydney for you, even going to the cricket is a miserable day out.
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Figured you'd get a kick outa that. Cant see how it'd be any different in most other grounds with large open seating areas. They have the same scorching temps, uncomfortable plastic seats and raucous crowd behaviour to put up with..
 
Due to covid19 you will find most things have been given the year off because of how it impacts lives.

It will be back once covid19 is under control.
 
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