Cricket Australia will now look at alternative ways to inject private capital into the BBL after Queensland joined New South Wales (NSW) in rejecting the initial proposal to sell stakes of the eight BBL clubs to private investors.
NSW, who control Sydney Sixers and Sydney Thunder, had been firmly against the privatisation model that was presented by CA to the six state chief executives at a meeting in Melbourne in late March. Queensland, who operate Brisbane Heat, had initially asked for more time and clarity on a number of points in the proposal following a Queensland Cricket board meeting a fortnight ago.
Following discussions with CA, Queensland have decided to join NSW in rejecting the proposal in its entirety.
Queensland Cricket informed CA chief executive Todd Greenberg and chair Mike Baird on Wednesday of their position before releasing a statement on Thursday. "The Board and Management of Queensland Cricket have carefully considered the proposal to participate in the privatisation of Big Bash League (BBL) Teams, including the Brisbane Heat," the statement said. "Cricket Australia and Queensland Cricket have maintained a productive and respectful relationship over the past twelve months as we've worked together to determine the best outcome for both parties and the game.
"Today, we have informed Cricket Australia that we will not be moving to the next phase of the sales process. Instead, we wish to continue to find ways to work with Cricket Australia to grow the Big Bash Leagues in Australia and make it one of the best T20 competitions throughout the world, without selling a minority share in the Brisbane Heat.
"Queensland Cricket has completed an exhaustive due diligence process over the past several months and we thank Cricket Australia for the additional time to complete this. Queensland Cricket remains focused on promoting and growing the game across Queensland and throughout Australia to accelerate participation in our sport."
Speaking to media on Thursday, Greenberg said CA will now look at alternative models of how to progress but explained it would be difficult given each state's position. "New South Wales and Queensland are certainly not supportive of private capital," he said. "New South Wales have an alternative model to self-fund it. Queensland don't have an alternative model, but they don't believe that private capital is something for them.
"South Australia, I would suggest they're in a hybrid situation where they would like the ability for some states to be able to take the opportunity to bring private capital in, and some states to come in later at their choice. And then we've got three other states, Victoria, WA and Tasmania, who are very strong and very supportive of the opportunity to bring private capital into their state. So if you're sitting in my shoes, with a federated model and six members, that's why it's difficult."
Greenberg said that there was a distinct difference between Queensland's objection to privatisation and NSW's view.
"There's difference between the two nos," he said. "Queensland are not supportive of a growth in player payments. And New South Wales are definitely of the view that we need to invest more into the Big Bash and the players. But they don't think that should be done through private capital. They prefer to find ways of self-funding that, doing that through additional incremental revenue that we would generate. So they are different."
Part of NSW's proposal to self-fund the game is to increase wagering revenue through legal mechanisms as there is a belief that CA and the BBL are not extracting the same value that other Australian sports leagues are from the wagering industry via product fees, which are fees paid by licensed wagering operators to sporting bodies in Australia for the right to use their data and offer betting markets.
CA is steadfast in its stance that it will not raise revenue via those means. "Our view is that that's not a step that the sport would accept," Greenberg said. "To back itself on wagering is not a way to fund the game. It's been very clear from the CA board."
One of the key reasons CA is pursuing private investment for the BBL, aside from increasing overall revenue for the competition and for CA more broadly, is to ensure that player payments can keep pace with the global market.
There were two South African players, Dewald Brevis and Aiden Markram, who earned more than AU$1 million to play in the SA20 last season. At present, no Australian player earns more than AU$400,000 for a single season in the BBL and most of Australia's best T20 players earn under AU$300,000 given the men's BBL salary cap is currently AU$3,121,200 spread across 18 players. Yet, quite a few Australian players earn more than Brevis and Markram in the IPL and Tim David will also earn well over double his BBL contract in this year's Hundred after being bought for AU$658,000 at the auction.
The concern from CA is that Australian players may opt to play franchise cricket overseas and not play for Australia or in the BBL if the gulf between local earnings and overseas earnings becomes too great to pass up.
"Without an increase in player payments, we are at risk over time," Greenberg said. "That's been one of the risks that we've been assessing is can we keep pace with the global market and the global demands, and can we do that without private capital? That is a real challenge for us."
There are grave concerns around Australian cricket broadly, even among the states that have supported the move to privatise the BBL, about the cost of allowing overseas investors into the league in terms of losing control of Australian cricket to foreign owners who do not have its best interests at heart.
Greenberg articulated how CA's proposal would mitigate against that risk and that CA would attempt to retain complete control of the BBL, the home international schedule and its players.
"What we have put in this project is that the capital comes into the clubs, not into the league, not into the governing body, so not into the decision-making of the sport as such," Greenberg said. "The capital goes into clubs to better run clubs, to try to assist clubs. But it's not coming into the sport, it's not coming to the league. And I think that's a really important distinction.
"So we think the risks and controls are about who you partner with, the types of people that you want to bring into those partnerships, and what you're looking to achieve from them.
"And again, the six states have completely opposing views of the type of partners they want to bring in. Some are absolutely very interested in IPL ownership, some have the complete opposite [view]. I don't know who's right or wrong but they have differing views, and they have a risk appetite that they will obviously look through, and we've been helping them understand and mitigate what those risks look like."
Greenberg said CA will now look at a hybrid model of privatisation, similar to what South Australia have proposed, but admitted it will need time to analyse all aspects of how that would work.
CA had always planned to have the BBL remain in its current form for the 2026-27 season with a view to progressing to a league with private investment by 2027-28. The current broadcast agreement with Channel Seven and Foxtel runs until 2031.