Cricketers hope fans on side in pay battle

AUSTRALIAN players are confident they maintain the support of an increasingly disillusioned cricketing public, as they yesterday tempered a planned boycott of South Africa with a proposal to save the all-important Ashes.

The game has been dragged through the mud by months of ugly fighting between Cricket Australia and the players’ association but yesterday the real consequences of the pay dispute were laid bare for the average fan as an Australia A side led by Usman Khawaja confirmed they are set to abandon a tour of South Africa.

Frustrated players united as one at an extraordinary meeting in Sydney adamant Cricket Australia’s hardball tactics left them no choice but to hit back with their own powerful message and down tools for the A tour, unless a new MOU is struck by Friday.

But the ACA announced the unanimous decision to put the blowtorch back on CA by refusing to play wouldn’t come at the expense of cricket’s greatest showpiece – the Ashes – which they propose can be rescued by sub-contracting player rights back to Cricket Australia if a worse-case scenario prevails in the summer.

A war born out of fiercely opposed ideologies over the revenue share model threatens to tear the summer pastime apart, and Australian Cricketers Association executive Shane Watson yesterday acknowledged that the fight will be for nothing if the players lose the lifeblood of the game – the fan.

Watson feels the fans are largely sympathetic to their cause and that fighting for retention of the revenue share model isn’t a cash grab.

“Yep, there’s no question (the fan is the most important stakeholder). It’s as simple as understanding we’re not asking for any more money,” Watson said.

“From my perspective and what I’ve seen and what I’ve heard, absolutely, the majority of people understand that we’re not being unfair.”