Threatening players is risky mistake — union
The brinkmanship that is Cricket Australia’s pay dispute with the players’ union continues to bubble, with the latter warning the governing body they risk making a “dangerous” and unnecessary mistake.
The current Memorandum of Understanding ( MoU) expires on June 30 and there has been little progress in protracted talks regarding a new deal.
The stumbling block is the revenue-sharing model that governs players’ wages. CA want it scrapped, while the Australian Cricketers’ Association (ACA) are adamant that can’t and won’t happen.
Even if the deadline passes, both parties could sign a stop-gap agree- ment that ensures this summer’s Ashes and Australia’s mooted tour of Bangladesh in August is not affected.
However, Cricket Australia (CA) chief executive James Sutherland recently indicated his organisation were not contemplating such arrangements in a stern email to players. Vice-captain David Warner fired back at his boss, declaring players could sign up with Twenty20 franchises around the world if they were unemployed on July 1. ACA chief executive Alistair Nicholson agrees with Australia’s opening batsman, whose stocks rose even further in the just-completed IPL. “To threaten Australia’s cricketers shows an apparent lack of appreciation of international circumstances,” Nicholson said. “CA forcing them into unem- ployment is an open invitation to the international cricket world. It’s a dangerous mistake and one that is completely unnecessary.
“When you threaten them with unemployment you place them squarely in the sights of the new cricket world.”
Nicholson added that players were “in high demand for more money all over the world” but desperate to play for Australia plus their state and Big Bash League sides.
“If they were being greedy they would have taken the deals CA were offering them,” Nicholson said, referencing the fact Warner and other test stars would be paid higher wages under CA’s proposal.