Cricket: Australians may go on strike – reports

SYDNEY: Australia’s cricketers may go on strike ahead of next month’s one-day tour of England over performance-related pay issues, according to reports. Australian Cricketers Association (ACA) head Paul Marsh said there were contingency plans should a resolution not be agreed with Cricket Australia before July 1. The Australian newspaper said players have examined a boycott of next month’s one-day tour of England or the World Twenty20 in Sri Lanka in September-October. “Relationships between players and management are heated and threatening to become as ugly as the stand-off surrounding the first player contract negotiations during Mark Taylor’s captaincy (1994-1999),” said the newspaper. “Cricket Australia is playing hardball in negotiations and has frozen all state and Big Bash (domestic T20) contract talks under the threat of a AUD50,000 fine until the new agreement is in place.”

Published in The Express Tribune, June 3^rd, 2012.