Cricketers are massively overpaid and do not deserve the money they get. They are certainly not the only ones but cricket is a sport and should be treated like that not a massive money making business.

Which cricketers, where? Only big 3 cricketers are millionaires. SA, SL, WI, NZ, no - just no. It's about IPL contracts for those guys. Your domestic cricketers out earn their international cricketers.

There's so many holes in your argument. The IPL makes billions, and has salaries as high as 2.4m AUD for 2 months work. Are they over paid? The tournament makes a fortune. If the IPL doesn't do it - someone else will and pay them the same. The ICL and World Series Cricket have already come along and proven this.

Explain to me why sport should not be a money making entertainment business but that music or movies should be? Why and how are they overpaid compared to surgeons and partners in elite law firms? 

You havn't made an argument. All you've done is make a couple of statements which beg the question.

How is massively overpaid worth to be deservedly valued if not market value? Are you a communist?

Yes, you resort to suggesting I am a communist, how immature.

And if you are too stupid to realise I am talking about Australian cricketers then I am not sure it is worth continuing to reply to you.

Well if you're too stupid to realise that the world cup funds countries besides Australia, who exactly is Australia going to play test cricket against?

I've made this point to you several times now. It's not all about Australia. You need some teams to play against. And who exactly is going to be left playing for Australia, when Packer wrote cheques, he bought the entire Australian team worth having. Money talks. 

So if you're not a communist, how do you think cricketers should be fairly valued if not the market?

Because if CA stops paying them highly, they'll go off an freelance in the t20 circuits globally for more money...

ABdV, Gayle, Pollard, McCullum, Vettorri, Bond, Abbott, Morkel, Bravo, Dre Russ, Narine... this is the reality...

The ACA players strike in an Ashes year. Cricketers, pro cricketers, they play for money. They're pro athletes. They sell services to the highest bidder to secure their future. It's their job. Half these guys quit education early just to pursue this career. They didn't forgo other opportunities to be an average joe. They saw a legitimate career option that was doing something they loved. I love cricket - but pro cricketer was never an option for me. Was it for you? It was for these guys. T20 fake cricket keeps them playing into their 40's often now - look at Hussey, look at Warne. Watto is still t20ing around many years after intl retirement. Hodge, Hogg, Gilchrist, still banked those t20 cheques happily.

Yes they're much richer than the average joe, they want to be richer than the average joe, the average joe wants to be richer than the average joe...

So this is the basic reality Test Cricket fan, seeing you do not get it. You don't get to eliminate the ICC fake cricket events, the IPL, the BBL and whatever else, without finding a way for test cricket to raise the same revenue if not more. Because test cricket is not paying the bills. If you cut player salaries, a media mogul will come in and buy the players for market wanted fake cricket.

So how does one make the consumer buy and pay for something that they do not want? You don't without government intervention. And this would require the governments of all test nations... well Trinidiad, Jamaica, NZ, SA, SL, Bang, Pak, etc - do not have the money to pay for your little dream of test cricket only. 

So suck it up. And get used to it. And be grateful, yes grateful, you still have any test cricket left at all. Because its being paid for by fake cricket.

That is the problem.

No more

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K4iEdMMjqdA

In relation to their poor returns many Os cricketers are overpaid. I hear what you are saying about the other nations outside the Big 3. Instead of them wingeing about it why dont they fite fire with fire and create their own IPL like tournament.. or at least something equivalent to BBL or bigger. Put some pressure on the moguls running the Indian league.

They're not whinging about it. They're leaving for the IPL.

The Big 3 is the Big 3 because they're the only nations with the money and enough cricket fans, to make real money out of cricket. England has the Hundred comming. It has nothing to do with skill, else Safrica would be a member. Everyone else outside the big 3 is reliant on ICC revenue and Indian tv audiences. Pakistan has the PSL and gets money from Indians watching it - but they're starving for more games against India despite the Asian cup helping them. Bangladesh has the BPL - again they get some money from India. West Indies has the CPL - not profitable. NZ has the Super Smash - stuff all games are televised because there are no rating for it. NZ'ers don't watch much cricket. SA tried a blast - and it failed to get off the ground. They've done a more low key re-jig. But again, Saffirs are not into cricket that much.

So all the non- Big 3 player's are prone to be lured by higher wages off shore. 

It's not the problem. It's a free market and these people are selling their labour. And people want to hire them to make money for them. The Kerry Packer, ICL, the IPL - cricket has long been a business. To say this is wrong is to advance a socialistic argument, I'm sorry if that offends you, but that's what it is.

Cricketers outside the Big 3, don't earn big money at domestic, they earn frighteningly little money. Many retire early, just to go and earn a full time wage elsewhere. So did NZ's full time national cricketers. Even in the 1980's John Reid, NZ's star batsman with Crowe, retired early to go be a school teacher. This trend continued in NZ well into the 2000's and possibly 2010's. It has gotten better of late with increased ICC funding. But the domestic salaries are not going to make anyone rich in NZ. At all. Even Greg Chappel missed tours post Packer for business reason. Remember?

The money from Indian cricket is majority raised from fake cricket - their IPL makes them rich. Aus and Eng - it's fake cricket and the Ashes. Everywhere else - its Indian tours and ICC funds from fake cricket. Fake cricket makes the world go around. For any team to have an intl team, they need a domestic supporting structure that needs to be pro. Only the Big 3 are really paying well there. 

Aus domestic players outearn NZ national players. SA current players leave SA for county cricket in droves, Rossow, Abbott, MMorkel - ABdV for IPL. You must have heard about the WI players and the IPL?

To say they don't need the money - is telling them they should remain poorer with less security simply for your entertainment. When they could be richer - for someone else's, or simply leave cricket and go into a firm and earn more doing an office job. 

Your Australia only argument doesn't hold, because Australia needs more teams to play against than just England. And England has 18 counties to support. It needs the fake cricket revenue to keep them afloat as it is.

It is an anti-capitalism argument, but that does not mean it is a pro communist argument. Capitalism is based on greed, a few get rich, the rest get left behind. People suffer because of those who take it all, it is not a fair society. Continually wanting more is wrong.

You are making an argument for socialism of cricket for the supposed good of test cricket. It is what it is. 

The further problem you have is the World Cups and WorldT20 are socialist in nature and make money for all ICC members to survive... India, Aus and Eng don't need the money. Everyone else desperately does. England probably needs a lot of it now too...

Players are just one of the expenses. There's umpires. Pitches. Groundsmen. Stadiums. Security (real security for Asia tours). Hotels. Airfares. Coaches. Doctors. Physios. Hospital and  Medical Bills. Food. ICC anti corruption units. It goes on and on.

Get rid of the World Cups, there is no ICC... Lose the ICC - media moguls and the BCCI will step in and make the game Pro Again on their own terms... 

No I am making an anti greed argument based on religion.

Socialism. But the ICC is already socialist for the good of test cricket and advancement of wider cricket.

Get rid of the World Cups, there is no ICC... Lose the ICC - media moguls and the BCCI will step in and make the game Pro Again on their own terms... 

More ICL, more IPL, more money making. And only India, Aus and Eng playing tests. If even India.

There is no point continuing this discussion.