New Zealand Cricket’s new initiative for the HRV Cup

PRESS RELEASE

New Zealand Cricket is delighted to announce that they have secured the services of Chris Gayle, Aaron Finch, Dwayne Bravo and Mitchell Johnson for the 2014/15 HRV Cup series.

The players have been contracted for the entire 20/20 season, and in an innovative move, will be rotated throughout all six provinces to ensure that whoever wins the tournament will be able to call upon two of the players at the Champions League 20/Twenty series.

New Zealand Cricket CEO David White stated (in a somewhat mellow and soothing manner) “We are very excited to have players of this calibre on board.  I’m sure the New Zealand public will embrace our philosophy of buying whoever we can in an attempt to rake in plenty of moolah in the long run”.

White also said that the idea of rotating the players throughout the provinces was his idea.  “We all know that under the current rules, a player only needs to represent a team once to qualify for selection in the Champions League. It’s obviously a ludicrous situation, but where there is money involved, we are very keen to exploit the loophole for our benefit.”

“We initially got the idea when the Otago Voltz….sorry, Volts….contracted West Indian Jason Holder for a one off game in the final of the HRV Cup in a blatant attempt to milk the system for all its worth.  It will be a costly exercise to contract four players of this stature for the entire season – we have to pay them for the six weeks off while we put the whole lot on hold – but we reckon it will be worthwhile when the Aces / Knights / Stags / Firebirds / Wizards / Volts bring home the cash from the big gig.  Oooops – almost said KFC Big Bash then!”

Chris Gayle stated that he was very excited by the innovation.  “This is right up my alley – not a test match in sight.”  White understood Gayle’s concerns. “We at NZ Cricket understand Chris Gayle’s concerns” he said.

Mitchell Johnson was almost speechless when told of his contract.  “I’m delighted to be part of NZ Cricket’s vision.  I’m also over the moon that Mum let me take up this contract. Sometimes she’s just so hard to please, but having me at home over Christmas was the clincher in her eyes”.

Despite seeing himself as an innovator of the game, White is also making no promises when it comes to the cutthroat aspect to professional sport.  “To be honest, I’m not quite sure what we’ll do when we have to cull two of the four players to meet the International player quota system.  The obvious solution is to register the Aces/Knights/Stags/Firebirds/Wizards/Volts as an IPL side so we can play all four of our imports.  But we’ll leave that for next season” White said stated (again, in a somewhat mellow and soothing manner).