“Do a Chris Gayle and play as free agents in domestic Twenty20 competitions”

Former Australian captain Ian Chappell known for not mincing his words has said that Australia’s cricket board gambled that greed would motivate top players into accepting a pay offer. He assessed that bet has backfired the parties are likely to thrash out a deal in time to avert an Ashes boycott. Players have rejected Cricket Australia’s (CA) offer that would end a 20-year-old revenue-sharing model when the next collective bargaining agreement starts in July. The proposal offers more money than the current five-year CBA but allows only international players to share in surplus revenues, while domestic cricketers would have to settle for fixed amounts. “I’m delighted the players are sticking together and staying strong on it,” Chappell said in comments published by a daily from Sydney. “From afar it looks as though the board are trying to splinter the players, which I find a rather strange tactic. Maybe the board thought, ‘You know what the players are like’. They were working on the theory of greed, that you keep the top blokes happy with money and they won’t care about the rest. Chappell said Australia’s top players could easily “do a Chris Gayle” and play as free agents in domestic Twenty20 competitions like the former West Indies Test captain did.