Cricket Australia’s CEO James Sutherland has revealed there is a possibility of adding more teams to their domestic T20 tournament, Big Bash League (BBL).
“We’re expanding the BBL next year in terms of number of matches. I’m not quite sure how long it will be before we expand the number of teams. But I do know that when we do, Geelong will be a very strong candidate,” Sutherland said on Monday (February 13).
“We’ve seen practice matches for the BBL down here and we’ve seen good crowds here before. But this is really the first major test – to have an international match here. We know there’s a lot of enthusiasm, culturally cricket is really strong down here, over 20,000 participants in the region. But I’d like to see on the weekend just how the community supports big-time cricket coming here,” he added.
However, Cricket Australia is in no urgency in expanding the teams as of now but would like to do it soon.
“The expansion of the Big Bash League in number of games does present an opportunity,” Sutherland said.
“I think we’ll have a bit of an indicator on Sunday to see the response of the local community and from Melbourne and other regional areas around here to see how much they embrace international cricket here, and who knows, it might well be Big Bash here next season as well.”
There could be huge changes in the international calendar from next season as England and South Africa have also began their own T20 Leagues.
Sutherland also revealed the Boxing Day Test and the New Year Test might not be guaranteed to be played at Melbourne and Sydney respectively from next season.
“I’d like to say they are [quarantined] but they’re not totally guaranteed,” Sutherland told the ABC.
“I think we would like to see it unfold in such a way that we can secure those matches but it’s actually a very congested schedule through the traditional Australian summer.
“I think one of the good things is that visiting countries do really enjoy the experience of playing in a Boxing Day Test match and a New Year’s Test match in Sydney but that doesn’t necessarily guarantee that we’d be able to secure that, but we’d like to think we will be able to,” he concluded.