Players Sign Pay Deal To Avert Cricket Strike

An "anticipated stand-off" between Cricket Australia and its players over money was averted "after the sport's governing body agreed, among other concessions, to set aside more than a quarter of the revenue generated by the 2015 World Cup for the nation's first-class players," according to the SYDNEY MORNING HERALD. Cricket Australia and the player's advocate, the Australian Cricketer's Association, have "signed a new memorandum of understanding" ahead of the June 30 deadline. A breakthrough was CA's decision to provide the ACA with 26% of revenue from the World Cup to be jointly hosted by Australia and New Zealand in '15. However, other points described as ''quite generous'' included the performance model increasing from 24.5% to 27%, the state pool retainer growing from $6M to $7.8M and the average state cricketer's contract increasing from $55,000 to $65,000 (SYDNEY MORNING HERALD, 6/20).