Fight for relevance: How the footy codes consumed the summer game
London: The union boss representing Australia's cricketers believes the summer game must fight harder against the football codes in the war for relevance in Australia, fearing the national sport is only truly visible for about two months of the year.
In his decade at the AFL Players' Association, Paul Marsh looked across at cricket and perceived a shrinking window of primary interest for the game.
He has now returned to the Australian Cricketers Association post that he left in 2014, with a driving passion to work on the big picture of cricket with his predecessor and now Cricket Australia chief executive Todd Greenberg.
Marsh, who spoke candidly with this masthead in London this week, deflected suggestions that he had once been approached to run CA himself, but was more expansive on cricket's structural challenges overseas and the fight for oxygen on home soil.
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While understanding that it was an International Cricket Council decision to award World Cup rights in Australia to Amazon Prime, Marsh questioned how many viewers were watching the showpiece final between Australia and South Africa at Lord's.
'Part of the goal of any sport should be to get as many fans engaged and watching and watching the contest as possible,' Marsh said. 'I don't know how many fans are watching the Test back in Australia. This is a huge game and it would be a great accomplishment if Australia were to win this. But how engaged are the people back home, who are our heartland?
'This is not a Cricket Australia decision, clearly an ICC decision. CA has taken some steps to get the media across this, cross-promoting it, so they're trying to get people engaged, which is great. But in an ideal world what we're trying to do is get as many people engaged and watching as possible and the financial returns will flow from that as well.'
At the AFLPA, Marsh found himself navigating challenges as broad as COVID-19 and collective bargaining with the league. More often, though, he was in the middle of issues around player welfare, concussion and illicit drugs that also exist in cricket but are so much more highlighted in football.
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