Under-pressure Kevin Roberts left facing the axe

Following two months of defending Cricket Australia’s (CA) decision to stand down staff and personnel in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, CEO Kevin Roberts now is himself left facing the axe. According to reports, CA will move on without Roberts and appoint an interim in his place at their board meeting on Wednesday (June 17). The incumbent CEO has been under fire ever since news emerged that the board were facing a serious financial crisis in case of the next summer of cricket, including the high-profile India tour, not going ahead.

Roberts had originally replaced long-standing CEO James Sutherland in the aftermath of the 2018 ball-tampering scandal. He had earlier deputised under Sutherland and led the negotiations briefly with the Australian Cricketers Association (ACA) during the contentious pay-dispute that’d rocked Australian cricket in 2017. His reign as CEO had been a rather successful one as Australia bounced back from the Cape Town episode with a better culture on and off the field along with some significant results, including retaining the Ashes in England and going unbeaten during their last home summer.

But it’s all gone pear-shaped ever since the first pay-cuts-20 per cent of the staff including head coach Justin Langer having been levelled with an 80 per cent slash-were announced in April. Eyebrows were raised around the country over the panic-stricken actions of the CA, including talk of impending doom, considering they’d only lost 2 ODIs in their home season.

Roberts fronted to the media on a couple of occasions since those early announcements, each time explaining the dire situation that the pandemic had left CA in and how the austerity measures had been essential if not necessary to keep them afloat. Those measures had also included massive cuts on grants to state associations, which has since become a major bone of contention between most of them and CA. New South Wales and Queensland in particular have stood steadfast against accepting any such measures. And most importantly in an ominous flashback to the early rumblings between the players and CA back in 2017, the board’s rather pessimistic projected revenues and potential losses haven’t been accepted by the ACA or those that it represents. There have even been reports in The Australian revealing that the players had filed a dispute notice last Thursday (June 11) against CA’s projections with the issue set to end in court if not sorted out at early.

Ironically, the rapidly improving scenario in Australia with regards to its response to the virus has only put Roberts on even worse footing, adding more layers of cloud over his continued stance over staff cuts and financial insecurity. More so when he addressed the media a day after CA had announced a rather ambitious schedule for their 2020-21 home summer, which is expected to run from August 9 to February 2 of next year, and still believed his decisions in April were justified.

There has also been talk, though not officially, from broadcasters Fox and Channel 7 about possible revisions to their existing deals regarding cricket. But unlike the AFL and the NRL, where Fox and 7 have altered their deals, cricket at this stage looks unlikely to not offer their broadcast partners a full-fledged summer if the Covid-19 situation in the country continues to stay the same.

Roberts had estimated a loss of 50 million AUD as part of the “economic pain” that CA would have to face in case the cricket, including the India tour, was played in front of empty stands. The last weekend though has seen the return of crowds, even though to a very small extent, with the Adelaide Oval playing host to 2240 fans for an AFL match.

“We reach a point in early September where if there’s more shocks as we’ve had over the last month or more, where our reserves are very thin and in fact effectively, we’d chart a path to zero if we didn’t take drastic action. If we weren’t doing that, we would be managing this situation by looking in the rear vision mirror and that’s not what we’re charged to do,” is how Roberts had described CA’s drastic measures back on April 21. Less than two months later, as CA seem in a good enough position to avoid “a path to zero” despite the collateral damage those decisions have resulted in, it’s Roberts who unfortunately seems set to end up on the rear vision mirror.