Cricket Australia Extends Radio Broadcast Deals

Cricket Australia has announced an extension and expansion of its audio rights deals with ABC, SEN, and Triple M, ensuring increased cricket coverage on the airwaves for the next seven summers, up to the 2030-31 season.

These new agreements align with CA’s existing broadcast rights deals with the Seven Network and Foxtel. As a result, fans can expect enhanced radio coverage, particularly of women’s T20 International cricket, which will now be broadcast on Triple M for the first time. Coverage of both men’s and women’s Big Bash Leagues (BBL) will also be expanded across these networks.

Triple M will cover three women’s T20 internationals each season, in addition to the men’s T20 internationals, Tests, and One Day Internationals (ODIs) already in their schedule. The ABC, which will be celebrating nearly 100 years of cricket broadcasting by the end of this deal, will add KFC BBL matches to its roster while continuing to cover all men’s and women’s internationals and the Weber Women’s Big Bash League (WBBL).

SEN will extend its coverage to include the WBBL, alongside its broadcasts of all men’s and women’s internationals and the BBL. Audio feeds from ABC, SEN, and Southern Cross Austereo (Triple M’s parent company) will remain accessible through the CA Live app and cricket.com.au, as well as the networks’ own digital platforms.

SCA CEO John Kelly expressed the network’s enthusiasm for expanding coverage, particularly of the women’s game, and promised the network’s trademark lively commentary. This summer, Australia’s women’s team will play six T20 internationals at home, including three matches against New Zealand from September 19 to 24 in Mackay and Brisbane, as preparation for the T20 World Cup in Bangladesh. They will also face England in a multi-format Ashes series in January, highlighted by a historic Test match at the MCG on the 90th anniversary of the first women’s Test between the two nations.

The men’s team will host Pakistan for white-ball fixtures in November, followed by the five-Test Border-Gavaskar series against India, commencing in Perth on November 22.

The Big Bash Leagues will also see renewed excitement this summer with revised rules and shorter seasons. The WBBL is set to begin on October 27, and the BBL will start on December 15.

Kate Ingber, CA’s Executive General Manager of Business and Legal Affairs, emphasised the significance of the extended partnerships, stating, “Cricket is the sound of summer and we are fortunate to have partners who will provide knowledgeable and passionate coverage of major events, including the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, Women’s and Men’s Ashes, and the Big Bash Leagues across their stations and digital platforms.”

Commentary line-ups are yet to be finalised, but renowned ABC commentator Jim Maxwell indicated he would continue his role, stating he is “mainly” retired but still engaged in calling Test cricket for the national broadcaster.