Back in the ’90s, 2000’s and even before that, Sheffield Shield cricket was a fierce competition. Featuring hard-nose cricketers such as Stuart Law, Michael Di Venuto, Andy Bichel, Brad Hodge, Simon Katich, and the list goes on.
These matches were labelled ‘Tougher than Tests’ consisting of fierce rivalries between states. The tense competitions became the breeding grounds for producing ready-made international players we enjoyed watching for years.
But now, the edge that state cricket had once before has lost its touch. Back in March, Western Australia won its second Sheffield Shield title in a row, cruising their way to victory against Victoria and highlighting that the gap between the best and worst is alarmingly significant.
South Australia has continued to struggle in the Sheffield Shield, being wooden spooners four times out of the past six seasons.
In 2021 SACA had an independent review of their operations whereby Michael Hussey gave a few frank recommendations. Hussey said, ‘Identify and try to recruit the best young talent around the country (former Australia U-19 players not contracted) and engage them through Premier Cricket, making them earn opportunities at the next level.’
Obviously one of the reasons for the Sheffield Shield, the One-Day Cup and BBL is to help produce the next generation of Australian players, however, state sides need to find a better balance. If the standard of state cricket gets stronger and young talented players have to bang the door down more, Australian cricket will be better off.
Western Australia celebrate after winning the Sheffield Shield Final. (Photo by Paul Kane/Getty Images)
Is it the best plan for state sides to play the talented kids but be uncompetitive at the same time?
After the 2018/19 summer, Victorian Cricket won the equivalent of a soccer treble, winning the Shield final against New South Wales, the One-Day Cup against Tasmania and both Melbourne-based Big Bash League franchises competed in the final.
When the season finished, Cricket Victoria decided to stop the two franchises’ independence and take full control of them. After the Renegades’ title-winning season, they were labelled a ‘development squad’ winning a measly 10 games out of their next 42 and finishing last three years in a row.
During those dour years there were some questionable list management decisions and team selections. Some would say many young Victorian players were gifted games even when they weren’t earned on merit.
In Jake Fraser-McGurk’s 24 batting innings in the BBL, he has averaged only 13.29 with a high score of just 40. Indeed, Jake Fraser-McGurk is an extremely talented cricketer with bat and in the field, but it is hard to say he earned the spot averaging just 25.25 in Premier cricket.
Will Sutherland is another who had a breakout summer for the Renegades last summer, but previously struggled in the three seasons prior. In the 2021/22 Big Bash season he played 10 matches averaging 5.2 with the bat and an economy rate of 11.14.
At the end of the 2021/2022 domestic season, Michael Hussey laid down another review, this time for the substandard performances of Victorian Cricket.
Hussey bluntly stated, ‘The philosophy of promoting talented or promising players by ‘gifting’ them opportunities before they may have been ready appears to have caused problems throughout the foundation pillars of the game, not just in Victoria but also in other states.’
New South Wales became another casualty of the same theme in the Sheffield Shield last season, with many young guns failing to fire. Highly rated prospect Jason Sangha averaged just 28.14 from 15 innings, with a high score of 54 against Tasmania in February. Opening batsman Blake Nikitaras was unable to cement his spot in the eleven averaging just 22.66 in his 15 innings. Yes NSW has a lot of International players lost but, having better pathways for selections should be looked into further.
Similarly to Michael Hussey’s thoughts, a frustrated former New South Wales player Stuart Clark accused Cricket NSW of being “fascinated with picking 19-year-olds and not those who have earned the right to play”.
The bad habits created by states certainly have frustrated many grade cricketers along the way, who have worked hard piling on runs for many years.
27-year-old Daniel Drew is a perfect example of a cricketer who has worked on his game for many years in grade cricket. The right-handed batsmen thrived last season having a new role in the number three position for South Australia hitting three 50s and a huge double century.
(Photo by Sarah Reed/Getty Images)
Daniel Drew was rewarded for his unbelievable Premier season in 2016-17 by winning the Bradman medal, South Australian Premier Cricket’s highest individual honour. Through the years Drew learnt his craft playing Premier cricket for West Torrens. Debuting for South Australia in 2019, he was dropped, worked on his weaknesses for the next two seasons and is now flourishing.
He is not the only grade cricketer who has continuously banged the door down year after year. James Seymour is another name who has dominated Victorian Premier cricket, scoring four centuries last season for Essendon, but only receiving two second-XI games for Victoria in return.
Why can’t sporting organisations embrace the phrase of age just being a number?
Veteran spinner Jon Holland at the end of last season was not given a contract with Victoria, with the view that Todd Murphy would be the man to take Victoria forward. Jon Holland said, “I was bowling as well as I’ve ever bowled in my career those last four games.”
So why are we so inclined to move on experienced players? Jon Holland would have been a great player for the younger players like Todd Murphy to learn from. Victoria could have used him as a handy replacement player in case of an injury and would be a seamless inclusion if needed.
If you look at American sports such as the NFL, fans and the league embrace their older players with many playing as quarterbacks and kickers for the team. In Baseball you have veterans still batting and pitching, so why can’t we do something similar?
Western Australian cricket looks to have a certain dynasty on its hands in all formats if other state sides don’t have a good hard look at themselves on the way they approach their cricket.
DTM
Roar Rookie
The arguments for selection for a spot in a Shield team, one day domestic team and a BBL team are different. I assume it's the same in other states, but Premier Cricket is played over 2 days of 90 overs with a week in between the 2 days (so Saturday and Saturday). This is not really much of a preparation for a 4 day game of 100 overs a day with some interstate travel thrown in. So selectors need to keep this in mind when considering performances in Premier Cricket. Each state will have their own strategies and since WA have won the last 2 titles perhaps we should look at what has worked in WA rather than what hasn't worked in NSW or Victoria.
BigGordon
Roar Rookie
I like to think I've got a pretty good idea what's going on in Australian cricket, but I wasn't aware of this scheme/plan. That begs the question, if I don't know, presumably most others don't know either which means it's not been widely published so of not, why not? If it's good for the game, it should be trumpeted from the rooftops, but the fact it's being done so secretively suggests it's a scheme that's flawed - or simply wrong.
Micko
Roar Rookie
Yeah, I've often thought about that 7th ACT side possibly entering, but (as you stated) it's going to be a massive cash drain with the women already draining any spare cash away. Plus, a lot of snouts in the trough (no doubt!) at CA, funneling good money away! :sick: :thumbdown:
Timmuh
Roar Guru
I think there is a bit of this, but also a fear among CA and the state associations that if young players aren't getting state contracts and games they will leave the sport. Including those with potential to go on to better things. But it does leave a weakened Shield. Adding another team, e.g. ACT, might not actually weaken the standard as much as people think as a result. It opens up an extra set of slots at the top level, and with professional level coaching. It may help keep veterans around the Shield to give the battle hardened edge and teaching opportunity, and open a couple of spots for youngsters as well without gifting players caps based on "potential". ACT would, like Tasmania, need to rely on a mix of locals and imports. However, Shield teams cost money and CA has a highly limited budget with a slice of those resources rightly given over to the womens game.
Liam Cole
Roar Rookie
Victorian state cricket certainly did in the BBL, with the Melbourne Renegades after they lost there independence.
Rellum
Roar Guru
Btw, we are finally seeing ex players calling out this destruction of the structure of the game to accommodate "identified" talents. Maybe when enough of them call it out we might see real change, quicker To me this system is Greg Chappell's creation along with CA. CA are trying, to me, to create a MLB style setup, completely forgetting how perfect it was before.
Rellum
Roar Guru
It's the PONI scheme. To put it basically,but these players are identified and pushed through the system based on instructions from the high performance unit of CA
BigGordon
Roar Rookie
Not sure about the Vics, but that's certainly the case with the other States. It would be really interesting to find out what logic selectors are actually using when making these calls.
Liam Cole
Roar Rookie
Victoria, SA and NSW in my opinion have taken it too far in bringing a heap of young talent who haven’t earned their spot on merit. This is leading too uncompetitive seasons which is quite hard to watch at times.
Liam Cole
Roar Rookie
I agree, I believe the young talent will come good, but is it worth comprising competitions like the Sheffield Shield. The states need to find a better way of balancing youth and experience not just putting them all at once.
Liam Cole
Roar Rookie
I hope not, l believe the young talent shouldn’t be gifted games they should instead work hard and bang the door down like the generation before did.
BigGordon
Roar Rookie
I'm not sure that selectors have a love affair with youth as this piece suggests. Yes they're bringing lots of teenagers into various squads, but why are they doing that? All have played at least Shield cricket and know how hard it is for youth to do well unless there's a lot of support but I suspect they feel like they've no choice. Teams like WA who have done well in recent times, have had lots of very experienced Shield/Test players, so blooding a few new blokes at a time, is simply part of the process. Ditto with the Qlders & the Vics and even Tassie in the past decade. That doesn't excuse selectors from ignoring form and age should be a very minor consideration. The more important factor has to be how a bloke's doing with bat, ball or gloves and whether he has what it takes to take the next step up.
Rellum
Roar Guru
I have harped on about this issue on this site for years now. The States KPI's from CA is to get players selected in the national teams. They put all their focus on PONI's for that reason. Combined with and because of Greg Chappell's disastrous time leading the development of players this leads to all sorts of silliness in focusing on players who get picked for u17 teams only ever having the chance to progress and the older issues of players being rested or subbed out of games. The easy fix is for the State's only focus to be winning the Shield, One Day comp and I guess to a degree the Big Bash. The States should be going at it and all should be separate entities, which includes high performance and elite junior programs. Let the heat of competition be the driver of better players, not Greg Chappell and CA. Part of that has to be players proving themselves at each level before getting higher honours. Young players should only be promoted if there are no other star young players and there is not performing players in the State team already. If you are not good enough to unseat an existing player then you are not good enough or they are still very good.
Rowdy
Roar Rookie
I was a HS teacher before the PC scheisse-based faklse-allegation ruined my working career. I loved the job and one of the ways to get kids interested was to take them playing for the various sporting teams that schools could access thru competition. The hours of extra work never bothered me because it gave kids a way of expressing themselves physically. ——- Unfortunately many kids aren’t motivated because of the ‘diffusion of choice’ available. Also families are smaller so there appears to be a dropping of natural competitiveness that comes from having lots of siblings. That’s a thing ——– Another is school rules. One I’ll discuss here but there are many things like this now. I coached Australian Football in Rugby League heartland schools. There was a ban on tackling at lunch time so the kids had to play touch. Because l normally was the the lone Aussie Rules guy many teachers said, erroneously, that there was no tackling in AF. So I used that loophole with the kids when l was on duty. You see l emphasised tackling in AF when l coached it. The kids that slowly ventured to play it in the first year would see me come down on yard duty and say “Can you let us play AF? WHY? Because they knew the teachers said there was no tackling in AF but here l was promoting it in AF. Now this excited the kids to play. So, ofc, the kids could get to tackle because they were playing AF :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: So when they knew l was involved in cricket too the numbers went up too. ——– The point to what I’ve said is that we won’t get State Cricket Associations to get more numbers and more competition unless we have teachers who see their roles as more than what is taught in the classroom. Even in classrooms now we have perfectly formed teachers who are useless at their own subjects. I’ve had to teach newly minted Science teachers Organic Chemistry because they had no training in it!!!. So it scares me that there is teachers who have no interest in sport or camping or fishing. We need enthusiastic teachers to do it. Without it won’t happen. Even tho I’m mid-60s now if l was at school I’d be taking AF and Cricket teams and filling in for :football: , :tennis: & hockey too. ——— I despair.
Micko
Roar Rookie
Maybe CA is putting pressure on the states to be development squads rather than treating the Sheffield Shield as a bona fide competition?