Spring tides rising as washouts show futility of schedule

I'm gonna be honest. You've read this one before.

The hyperinflation of the modern game, where cricket is on all the time in a desperate attempt to stay relevant, while diluting its product with every caveated fixture.

It has been a constant question to Black Caps players this series.

"What's it like playing cricket in October?"

It is not cricket season here. The domestic season hasn't started yet - it begins in full this weekend. The opening match of New Zealand's series against Australia earlier this month was played on October 1, the earliest that the Kiwis had ever played a home international.

Six matches and three washouts later, the result was entirely predictable. It rained. A lot. The weather here has, admittedly, been extreme. Warnings were announced for much of the country as high winds left 90,000 homes on the South Island without power. Kiwi head coach Rob Walter made the point that, across both the Australia and England series, they had been unlucky with sunny training days sandwiching rainy matchdays. That is true - and in his position it is a point he is almost contractually obliged to make - but some sunny days and some rainy days sounds an awful lot like the middle of spring to me.

The result was an uncomfortable theme that ran throughout, of Kiwi players talking about the importance of taking the opportunity to play the likes of Australia or England whenever you can. A team that won the World Test Championship in 2021, and has reached numerous ICC finals in recent years, is still thankful for the chance to take the pitch against their equals.

"You've got to take every chance to play them," Kiwi wicketkeeper Tim Seifert said ahead of the match at Auckland. "You'd rather play them at this time of the year than not."

For the second year in a row, New Zealand have no home international cricket scheduled for January or February. The height of their summer. The rest of their season consists of West Indies arriving for a multi-format tour in November and South Africa arriving for a white-ball tour in March, which will clash directly with the IPL and be without several high-profile players for either side.

"There's no point trying to compete against some of the top franchise leagues," explained Walter after the Auckland washout. "But rather coexist with them."

And are they co-existing?

"It depends on who you ask, I guess."

New Zealand have been up against this for years. Shane Bond missed 18 months of international cricket in 2007 after signing up for the Indian Cricket League. Trent Boult was the first Kiwi to move to a "casual" contract in 2022 and now there are five players - Finn Allen, Devon Conway, Lockie Ferguson, Tim Seifert and Kane Williamson - in the New Zealand squad who operate on such a deal. The cold hard cash facts are that top Black Caps players believe they can earn up to US$1 million more a year by pursuing a life solely on the franchise circuit.

"We are really privileged that the guys really do enjoy playing for their country and want to come back and play for the Black Caps," said Walter. "We want to maintain that but part of the job is understanding that you can't have guys playing all formats and in every game."

The "casual" contracts symbolise a commitment from the player to be available for a certain number of matches a year. They operate on an annual basis and the number jumped from two to five this year due to the upcoming T20 World Cup, as the T20 specialists had to commit themselves to x number of games to be eligible for selection.

But it is wishful thinking to consider that any "casual" relationship can end well. Just ask any 20-year-old across the globe.

England, Australia and India are now committed to touring each other once a year. These arrangements take up space, meaning that other series end up being shortened, played with weakened sides, and pushed to the margins. And so the un-valuable series become even less valuable. And the invaluable tours become even more so. It is a vicious cycle. And one that administrators show no signs of breaking. South Africa, the current World Test Champions, are currently poised beautifully at one-all in their series against Pakistan - with zero games to play. An unsexy series, deprived of the chance to make itself more attractive to broadcasters next time round.

It would be funny if it wasn't so relentless. A year ago, England played a white-ball series in the West Indies with a second string squad because the matches had been sandwiched in between their Test tours of Pakistan and New Zealand. The games were scheduled, for broadcast reasons, at 4pm which had the double-jeopardy effect of meaning fewer fans could attend the game in person and dew had a decisive impact on each match as it arrived at the halfway stage in each fixture. Of the seven completed matches on that tour, all were won by the team who won the toss.

"When we looked at the schedule we knew that would be a problem," Windies captain at the time Rovman Powell said.

Cricket relies on broadcast rights to keep it, barely, afloat. The problem is that with every series that is designed for TV at the cost of quality, the product becomes less valuable the next time around. Ultimately, broadcasters are creating a product that, eventually, it won't want to buy itself.

You know this. You've read it before. And one day, hopefully, it will change. England won this three match T20I series one-nil. 61.4 overs were bowled.