Greater consultation will be sought by Australian teams about their use as a billboard for fossil fuels, gambling, fast food, alcohol and other sponsorship categories as Cricket Australia and the players’ union negotiate a new pay deal next year.
While the last agreement between CA and the Australian Cricketers Association enshrined the right of individual players to decline to endorse certain products on “reasonable personal grounds”, there is a desire for wider discussion about what types of corporate partners appear on team shirts or in advertising campaigns involving players.
The ACA is not pushing for a specific clause to be added to the MoU, rather for an understanding that more such conversations are had before commercial deals are reached, instead of after the fact.
Pat Cummins celebrates a wicket against Sri Lanka.Credit:Getty Images
These discussions are already taking place on some level, as evidenced by Test captain Pat Cummins’ talks with CA chief executive Nick Hockley, but the players would prefer to see ACA chief executive Todd Greenberg involved, reducing pressure on individual cricketers to make their views known.
For example, in the recent joint venture between CA and the ACA on NFTs or digital trading cards, the players asked to ensure that the chosen platform for the deal was as sustainable as possible, with a smaller carbon footprint than some.
The addition of Simon Longstaff as an independent ethics commissioner to Australian cricket also suggests that CA, the states and the players are increasingly thinking about issues on a more layered level than simple dollars and cents.
“Not running things past individual players but as a holistic kind of view, yes,” ACA board director Usman Khawaja told The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald. “We have a responsibility to the whole of cricket, whether that be drugs, alcohol, whatever it may be, we have a responsibility to the public of vetting sponsorships.
“I believe CA do already do that in some way, and there is an avenue where the ACA can be involved with them a little more strategically. I think the world is changing, not saying it’s changing in a specific direction, but inclusivity is a big part of it.
“And if inclusivity is a big part of it then you need to have these conversations, especially when it comes to team sports. I think that’s where it starts and stops.”
It was Khawaja who, alongside the wrist spinner Fawad Ahmed, first raised ethical objections to sponsorships when they asked not to have to wear alcohol logos on team kit for religious reasons. Khawaja said the level of consideration and respect he felt in that conversation had been a big step forward.
Usman Khawaja during the 2017 pay dispute. He sits on the ACA board alongside Pat Cummins.Credit:Michele Mossop
“It’s more of a personal thing for me – I’ve never drunk alcohol my whole life, I stay away from it, it’s not part of my belief system,” he said. “So I think CA and even the sponsors were very gracious at the time, saying ‘that’s fine, you don’t have to wear it if you don’t want to’. That was a very individual thing, I never stopped CA from having the sponsorships with alcohol and I never would.
“There’s always going to be some sponsors I feel very close to, very affiliated with – like KFC, I love their work, NRMA [insurance] have just come on board and I’ve been with NRMA since I had my first car as a kid, so easy affiliations there.
“But there’s going to be other ones I don’t have affiliations with, which is fine, I still appreciate them taking the time and money and effort to be involved. And there will be those like alcohol that on a personal level I will struggle to promote, but I think they’re very understanding of that.”
Greenberg has pointed out that in 2022, players are not only expected to endorse sponsors on CA’s behalf, but they are also active role players in the pitches made to prospective partners by the governing body’s commercial arm. On that basis, greater communication was only fair.
“What we’re seeing here is people having a view on certain things, and the really successful sports and governing bodies will have relationships with their players, and have the ability to listen and learn both ways,” Greenberg told SEN Radio.
“We have a responsibility to the whole of cricket, whether that be drugs, alcohol, whatever it may be, we have a responsibility to the public of vetting sponsorships.”
Usman Khawaja
“You can solve almost anything through good communication and dialogue, and you will fail spectacularly without good communication and dialogue.
“The players are invested here, and it’s not altruistic, they share in the game’s revenues, so they’re not going to do anything that will destroy the revenues of the game. But equally they’ve got strong views on things, so they want to be heard and they want a seat at the table, and that’s really important for the modern-day athlete.“
Earlier this year, Cummins hosted a Cricket for Climate summit in Sydney, attended by administrators, commercial partners and experts on the subject to discuss ways cricket could help bring about change.
“Honestly the engineers and scientists have done their job and what we now need is the cultural influence,” the engineer and climate campaigner Saul Griffith said at the conference. “We need all of our sports people to give all Australians permission to go to zero emissions.”
As far as climate activism was concerned, Greenberg said that Cummins was hardly pushing a minority view anymore.
“Climate change to Pat is intrinsic inside him, it’s who he is, it’s what he believes in,” he said. “Mind you, if you talk to most CEOs in any top ASX 100 company, I would suggest climate change is pretty high on their agendas as well.
“So in some respects they’ll be companies looking at this issue, saying ‘that’s the type of organisation I want to align with, I want to align with someone who thinks in a similar way’.
“Some people are suggesting this might hurt sponsorship, but I actually see it as a real positive, because brands want to align in an authentic way, as do players, so it may well strengthen some partnerships. We’re not here to please everybody – but him having strong views in certain areas is what makes him who he is. You can’t ask people to change, it’s not on and off like a radio.”
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