Greedy CA pushes its friendship

WHEN Cricket Australia does its inevitable review into what went wrong with its Big Bash TV rights deal, one word lies at the bottom of the mess … greed.

To get the magic $1 billion TV rights figure they so craved they had to stretch the Big Bash so far out of shape it morphed from that tasty snack that left you hungry for more into the main meal you couldn’t get through.

What other sporting competition has quickly grown from 32fixture games to around 60 matches without any push from broadcasters or fans?

Channel 7, who want to sell the Bash rights, have stunned the cricket world by their public attack on CA but their boldness is underpinned by the knowledge they will never be back so they have nothing to lose.

This will be their one and only deal with CA so there is no relationship to protect.

The one complicating factor for Seven now is if they do not sell the Big Bash, how on earth do they sell it to sponsors?

It’s hard to take your product to the market and give it the razzle dazzle sales pitch when your company is on the record saying it’s whiffier than your fishing tinny the day you failed to find that rogue prawn head.

Significantly, Channel 7 still have four years left on their cricket deal which may feel like 40 for them in the current environment.

The message for CA is they are good at doing deals but poor at maintaining relationships.

That point is spelt out by the fact that CA are now out of favour with all three free-to-air networks, with Channel 9 glad to be out and Channel 10 still furious at being told they had the rights, only to have that call change a couple of hours later.

Eventually, CA may reach that seismic moment where they ask themselves “I wonder whether the problem is us, not them?’’

The game is leaderless and rudderless. CA’s last voice of authority was Malcolm Speed, who left two decades ago.