Pay fight: Australian cricketers ready to wake up unemployed, says Josh Hazlewood
Fast bowler Josh Hazlewood says Australia's top cricketers are ready to wake up unemployed on Saturday, amid an extraordinary declaration from Cricket Australia that $1.2 million in saved player wages per fortnight would be redirected to grassroots cricket.
Cricket was in crisis on Friday, as CA and the Australian Cricketers' Association remained at loggerheads - but still feuding publicly - over a new memorandum of understanding nine months into battle. The deadline for a new deal expired at midnight.
Australia's cricketers are effectively unemployed after failing to reach an agreement with the sport's governing body.
The key issue remains CA's determination to no longer have players share in the game's gross revenue. They have done so since the initial MOU in 1997 but CA says the sport, particularly at a grass-roots level, can no longer prosper from this model, and is willing to only allow a percentage share of surplus funds.
CA's submission initially allowed only CA-contracted male and female players to share in surplus funds but last week it opened this up to state-based players, and removed the initial combined cap of $20 million.
Rival factions must drop hostilities and do a deal now
CA's projections have state-based players earning about $200,000 a season, with the top female cricketers to immediately rise to almost $200,000 – before surplus revenue share kicks in.
Players maintain this is still unacceptable and with the deadline for a new deal having expired, the sport has plunged into uncharted waters.
Hazlewood, ranked Australia's fourth most important player under CA's contract system, said CA's offer to state-based cricketers had been disrespectful.
"They always seem to point out the no crowds at Sheffield Shield cricket but they always leave out the Big Bash that draws in massive crowds every game," he said on Friday.
"The Australian cricket team aren't really a part of that to be honest. It's solely domestic players with, obviously, a couple of internationals in different teams. But they provide a great spectacle. That six weeks is just thriving with crowds ... I think they would feel disrespected, definitely."
Hazlewood said waking up effectively unemployed on Saturday was "going to be a different feel".
"To be contracted for the best part of 10 years, nearly for me, it's going to be a different stage and we'll see how it pans out," he said.
"It [pay negotiations] never got to this point before in the past. It's going to leave a bit of a bitter taste come that date [July 1] but we are, obviously, willing to do what we need to."
In a statement, CA, under the watch of chief executive James Sutherland, said it was "concerned" that many international and state- based players would be uncontracted "and this may place significant financial and emotional strain on them and their families".
"It is unfortunate that the ACA's hard line and inflexible position has not been conducive to delivering any positive outcomes or certainty for players," CA said. "CA has also been dismayed that the ACA's rhetoric, both publicly and directly to the players, has burdened the current generation of players with an unfair sense of responsibility for defending a decades old pay model that no longer suits the very different needs of the modern game.
"CA will allocate on a fortnightly basis all of the money it would otherwise be paying to out of contract players to the National Community Facilities Funding Scheme. This is expected to be in the order of $1.2 million per fortnight."
Players are due to share in about $500 million over the next five years, with the average CA men's base contract to rise to more than $800,000 by 2021-22.
The women's World Cup squad in England had signed a separate deal before leaving so those players will continue to be paid.
CA-contracted players and those state players on only one-year deals are due to receive their next payment on July 15 but that won't happen unless there is a major breakthrough.
The ACA, led by chief executive Alistair Nicholson, will hold a crisis meeting in Sydney on Sunday where a decision will be made on whether the Australia A side should tour South Africa in July. The 14-man squad had been due to gather in Brisbane on Tuesday, with the opening match on July 14.
That tour was going to be a "bowl off" between Jackson Bird, Chadd Sayers, Chris Tremain and Jason Behrendorff to replace fast bowler Mitchell Starc for the August tour of Bangladesh.
If players opt to boycott the trip to South Africa, those players would be denied their chance to push for Test selection – should the Bangladesh tour go ahead.
Hopes for a new deal being agreed soon would take a further nosedive if CA is forced to withdraw from the tri-series also featuring South Africa A and India A in what the governing body would regard as a strike from the state players in the squad on multi-year contracts.
It is understood, however, that a clause in state players' contracts only demands their participation in overseas tours that are organised by their state association. Players will not receive back pay should they strike.
There would still be more than four months for an agreement between the ACA and CA to be reached before this summer's Ashes series.