World Cricketers' Association to review broken & unsustainable scheduling

Mushrooming of the T20 leagues around the globe and cramping up of the calendar international cricket has put players under a lot of stress on whether to prioritise country over the franchise. In light of this pertaining issue, the World Cricketers' Association (WCA) started a review of the ‘broken and unsustainable’ schedule. 

With no hope of finding a "clear and coherent structure" in which international cricket and domestic leagues can co-exist, Heath Mills, the President of WCA quoted a survey to find the need for such a review. In the survey, 84% of the respondents (current players) wanted to have a say in the scheduling of the games and sought ‘ring-fenced windows’ to ensure international cricket and domestic T20 leagues can co-exist.

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Mills said that though the game is spoilt for choices in terms of format, there is no clarity in the leadership regarding efficient management. “To date, the game's leadership has collectively failed to come together to establish a clear and coherent global structure in which they can co-exist. We have virtually given up hope of it doing so,” he added. 

The association formed a six-member group which includes former Pakistan women’s captain Sana Mir, former Australian Cricketers' Association chief Paul Marsh, former WCA chief Tony Irish, former ECB CEO Tom Harrison and Sanjog Gupta (Head of Sports, Disney Star). 

The three major review points by the group will be the scheduling model, the growing economic disparity between members of the ICC and player employment and contracts. Once the key findings are made, the group will then present it to the WCA board which will further take it up with ICC and other stakeholders of the game. 

“The process we have put in place, guided by independent expertise, will be focussed on making recommendations to our Board on optimising the game's global structure, ensuring sustainable value, and providing more clarity, consistency, and less confusion for players, fans and commercial partners alike,” Mills explained how the review will work. 

Apart from the BCCI (India) and the PCB (Pakistan), all other major ICC members have players’ associations and WCA is the body that heads those players’ associations.

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