In Australian cricket’s most consequential announcement in a generation, Cricket Australia has finally revealed its long-awaited plans to privatise the Big Bash League. CA’s move makes sense on paper, but of course, cricket’s home is not on a balance sheet. Cricket lives in the hearts and minds of its fans, to whom CA’s move signifies a death knell for Australian cricket. The answer, as ever, lies somewhere in the middle.
What’s happening?
CA will commence with selling off the Melbourne Renegades ahead of the 2027-28 season. Other states will then be able to decide whether to invite private investment into their own BBL and WBBL teams, with CA predicting the process could ultimately generate more than $1 billion for Australian cricket.
There’s a perfectly sensible argument for private investment in the BBL. The global T20 market has exploded since the competition was established in 2011, with the IPL now operating on an entirely different financial planet, and competitions in England, South Africa, the UAE and even the United States competing for the same players, audiences and broadcast revenue. Australian cricket cannot afford to sit still, particularly when Australian players are increasingly able to earn more overseas than at home.
Put another way, CA wasn’t faced with a choice between preserving the status quo and inviting private capital: the choice was between the BBL rapidly losing value and relevance in a hyper-competitive and saturated T20 landscape, and securing the BBL’s future.
Why does CA need to sell off BBL clubs?
The BBL was created by CA as a commercial asset. It was designed to generate revenue, create new fans and participants, provide a domestic pathway for players and ultimately strengthen the entire Australian cricket ecosystem. It’s done a pretty good job of that. CA now wants to exchange ownership of that future revenue for an immediate cash injection, which it says will be reinvested into the game.
CA’s financial position explains the temptation: the organisation recorded an $11.3 million loss in 2024-25 after significant losses over the preceding years. But selling a valuable asset because the parent organisation has financial problems is not the same thing as fixing those financial problems. It is a capital solution to an operating problem.
Cricket NSW and Queensland Cricket have both resisted the proposal, arguing in various forms that the BBL’s problems should be addressed through greater investment and better commercial execution rather than simply selling ownership. That criticism deserves considerably more attention than it has received.
If the BBL can be made more valuable through better marketing, commercial execution, scheduling and greater investment – combined with operational efficiencies including innovation and cost reduction – why shouldn’t CA do those things itself and retain the upside? If a private investor is prepared to pay hundreds of millions of dollars, the investor presumably thinks there is considerable value still to be created.
But there’s unfortunately another uncomfortable reality sitting behind this debate, and it’s one which makes CA’s position considerably more defensible: Australian cricket’s long-term future is intrinsically linked to Indian investment, making it an outlier in the Australian sporting landscape.
Take the NRL for example, which recently signed a new broadcasting deal worth approximately $5.3 billion, the largest media rights agreement in the history of Australian sport. But the NRL is the world’s premier rugby league competition, meaning broadcasters and the NRL alike know that players, scheduling and other assets are protected, negating the need for outside capital.
The BBL meanwhile has to compete against several more premier competitions backed by vastly larger pools of both capital and players. And increasingly, that means Indian capital.
That is not in itself a bad thing. India has the world’s largest cricket market, the IPL has created enormous pools of private wealth and Indian investors are already buying into major sporting properties overseas. There is logic in bringing that money, expertise and commercial ambition into Australian cricket. The BBL could – in theory – become a much better product as a result.
But the proposal is fraught with risk.
What are the risks the BBL faces?
CA says it will retain control over international scheduling, player availability, salary caps, branding and investor approval. But CA is relying on the naivety of its stakeholders, who are already beginning to understand: it doesn’t really matter what CA (or the sale documentation) says, it’s all about commercial leverage.
A private franchise owner’s interests will often run counter to those of Australian cricket at large. An owner’s primary objective is to maximise the value of its franchise in a vacuum, whereas CA has to balance the BBL against Test cricket, state cricket, women’s cricket and the broader development of the game. If owners who have collectively spent $1 billion pressure CA for more BBL matches or greater representation of Australian players, what would CA do?
At best, CA would be forced to take its franchise owners’ interest into consideration. At worst, CA could become a lame duck beholden to the interests of foreign investors with no broader stake in Australian cricket.
Private ownership could transform the BBL and prove everyone wrong. It may bring investment that grassroots Australian cricket desperately needs.
But CA is the custodian of a game owned by the public, not a private equity fund trying to maximise this year’s exit value. Selling the farm to pay for the stock seems a curious way to do it.
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