Death via 1000 cuts

The unravelling of international cricket at the expense of global franchise T20 leagues took another blow today with the announcement that Conway and Allen have turned down central contracts, albeit in contrasting ways.

Allen has rolled the dice with his career, and has made national selection less likely, while Conway has gone down the Williamson route of making himself mostly available, committing to tests, the Champions Trophy, and the tri-series with Pakistan and South Africa leading up to that. ¹

They join Boult, Guptill, Williamson, Ferguson, Milne, De Grandomme, and Neesham in turning down central contracts for a range of reasons, and a range of messiness in handling of the situation.

Part of the today’s news is due to the lopsided nature of the pending home summer.  On one hand it is the first time there have been three home tests against a top tier nation prior to Christmas, and they are against a top tier nation, but what follows that is pretty sparse.

And with the growth of the IPL controlled South African league, we need to get our heads around the idea that home summers in the future are likely to be centred around pre-Christmas and a brief window (for now) at the end of February.   This is the bigger concern.

This is a situation that is not going to get better.  When the IPL overlords “rescued” South African cricket by buying their T20 league the rest of the world thought that was just something that was happening in another country.  But there is an element of thinking the assassination of Franz Ferdinand was just some instability in a Balkan state.

The South African T20 league is easily the biggest challenge facing NZ cricket; the IPL battle is lost, although the incessant growth of that window remains another threat.

In itself, looking at what’s coming up over the next 8 months, losing Williamson and Conway for some white ball cricket with Sri Lanka is pretty easy to take.  However, it’s the trend of where things are going.

It also means the 6 white ball home internationals against Sri Lanka in traditional peak time has become even less appealing with the top order unavailable.  But it’s worth noting that the reciprocal away series in November is also likely to be gutted for differing reasons.  Squeezed in between test series in India and at home against England there is a real likelihood that all four seam bowlers at a minimum will be sent home to rest,  As well as Conway, Williamson and Allen.

1. As a sidebar, it’s interesting they’ve made Conway commit to that tri-series. Maybe, just maybe, someone has had a lightbulb moment and realised the lack of build-up for this year’s ill-fated T20 World Cup campaign was a bad move, and must never be repeated.