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Cricket Australia management is letting down players and fans

Roar Rookie
8th September, 2013
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Cricket Australia CEO James Sutherland has stood firm in an ongoing pay dispute with Australia's cricketers. (AAP Image/Tracey Nearmy)
Roar Rookie
8th September, 2013
14

Australian cricket is in a state of transition – or free fall, depending who you speak to.

We are witnessing a period where management values giving players experience, yet also expects competitiveness. A time where coaches are seemingly encouraged to trial youth, but also allow them to prosper.

Underneath those unrealistic standards, which highlight the simple conflicts of Australian cricket in present day, lies the problem that has seen Michael Clarke leading his side through a ‘transitory period’ that is still yet to cease.

One could argue that the supposed detriments of these conflicts have contributed to this national decline alone, but in reality we are bearing witness to a far greater problem.

James Sutherland has been Chief Executive Officer of Cricket Australia since 2001. He is head of the ‘management’ that is currently doing a respectable job in terms of Cricket Australia’s financial and market-positioning performance.

He is also head of arguably Australia’s worst scheduling in recent times. The 2013 schedule has been bordering on ignorant in respect to upcoming challenges and the preparation necessary for such events.

In the lead-up to the Ashes series, Australia played five Test matches in 2013 – one against Sri Lanka at home, and four away to India.

The scheduling of Test series against subcontinent nations that are not known for their swing and pace attacks is hardly ideal preparation, particularly when you consider that four of the five were played on the dustbowls of India.

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Australia ended up losing the four away games. Although you could argue that it was good preparation for the similar pitches produced in England, logic would suggest such pitches were more a result of recent Australian failures than good forecasting on James Sutherland’s part.

The Champions Trophy in England, scheduled just before the Ashes began, was a compulsory event that left emotional damage both on and off the field.

Arguably the biggest effect of the event was the eventual sacking of coach Mickey Arthur, however hindsight would show us that the decision didn’t bear much change on the outcome.

So there we find ourselves, witnessing Australia’s Ashes eventuate into a tempestuous series, one that ended up only supporting the harsh diatribes delivered both home and abroad.

While you hope that such an outcome would have a cathartic effect on the team’s future preparation for the return bout back, scheduled a mere three months later, the team is left in a state of segregation.

Over the next two months the ‘team’, or half of it, will participate in the Generation-Y focused one-day format on 14 occasions, in England and again in India.

While England continue their team unity throughout the facets of their one-day teams, particularly the 50-over format, Australia tends to use such games as ‘trials’ for higher honours on the international stage. Just look at Fawad Ahmed now.

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In fact, of the squads used in the Champions Trophy from both England and Australia, England totalled 11 players that played in both the Champions Trophy and Ashes, while Australia managed just six.

One would think that the homogenous nature of the England cricket team throughout the last Ashes was a defining statement of their success – hardly the mark of a combined individual accomplishment that, statistically, many struggled to achieve.

Yet this is more a testament to the re-invigorated management of the England Cricket Board (ECB).

In past decades, the ECB has struggled with the same overriding problem as the management of Australia face now, just in a different context.

England’s ability to fix their problems and, in recent times, remain a stable force in world cricket is much due to their clearing of potential conflicts within English cricket.

The reliable nature of England’s internal influences allowed their Ashes squad to focus on the task at hand, effectively allowing them to float while Australia drowned in such doubts.

It is therefore notable that while England’s management will have their team preparing in Australia in two months’ time, calm, collected and in a coherent fashion, Australia will be overseas in India, most likely struggling in the middle of an unnecessary and terribly planned one-day series.

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This, in a way, symbolises the values of Australian cricket in its current time.

While the pinnacle of cricket for fans and players alike remains the Ashes, management now believes in two: one-day cricket and India.

In that sense, James Sutherland and his fellow counterparts’ pinnacle will occur in the month of October, a month prior to their fans, where riches will be presented. They will deliver a team as a ‘competitive force’, one that will more closely resemble a sacrificial lamb, compromising the very values of Australian cricket for monetary gain.

India is perhaps the worst possible place you could prepare for an upcoming Ashes series, particularly if you are only playing a one-day series. The cricketing world now revolves around India, mainly due to their growing and esteemed wealth. Consequently,

India possesses strong control of the game and how it is run. The outcome being that, in recent times, the BCCI have hardly proceeded with an egalitarian presence in regard to their views of cricket and a nations respective rights.

Just recently they have tried to alter South Africa’s plans for India’s tour there, planning their own home fixture against the West Indies in the same time frame without so much as notifying Cricket South Africa.

That knowledge makes the idea that Michael Clarke or Shane Watson could be rested from the series in preparation for the Ashes nothing more than fantasy. A stubbornly insular view on the subject from the BCCI is more likely.

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This will not only affect individuals, but also team performance.

Australian cricket, and particularly its management, has the luxury and privilege of limited competition from rival codes during the summer months of Australia.

But if Cricket Australia continues with management as poor and compromising as this, Australian fans will act through management’s biggest fear – a loss of interest.

James Sutherland and the surrounding board must realise that their best chance of achieving financial prosperity is through attracting fans, generally achieved through success. Just ask every other CEO in the country.

The simple way to achieve this is through astute and proper scheduling of future matches, giving Australia the best chance of being competitive in the long-term.

Australian cricket is going through a period not seen for thirty years. Transitory is not the word to describe it, for that refers to a short period of time.

This could take a decade, even a generation.

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It’s a time where Australian cricket is trying to find balance in light of the modern world, and make compromises in search for the balance that will satisfy players, fans, and management.

Cricket Australia must evolve, but not continue making on-field sacrifices for off-field financial prosperity.

They must once again restore the core values of performance-oriented success; to return to a time where success was nothing but assumed.

A time that James Sutherland began with, and a time he seems to have forgotten.

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