In Cricket Australia versus the players, it is as if they have had a toss, and both decided to bat, and both are out there now, one at each end, tapping their bats on the creases, chins jutting, waiting for a ball that will never come. Both know there needs to be a bowler, but are damned if it will be them.
Worse, both think they will win over the crowd this way, blind to the fact that as a duo they're going about as well as Malcolm Turnbull and Bill Shorten. It won't be long before the crowd gives up and goes off to the footy. They've been doing that for a while now anyway.
Consider Friday, D-Day minus seven. CA make it known it will be releasing a statement in the afternoon. Oblivious, the Australian Cricketers' Association issues its own release. So CA pre-releases its release. "Pay talks advance as CA revise MOU offer" trumpets CA's defiantly independent (can you tick that off, James?) website.Â
This is after days of little movement, followed by days of none at all, from two bodies who accuse each other of negotiating through media, before each rushing off to negotiate through media.
So CA said what it had to say on the ACA's say, earlier than it intended to say it, whereupon the ACA was convening to decide what to say on what it didn't know the CA was going to say until they said it.
You can't even be sure who the next sayperson will be. For CA, it is most often "a spokesman", or lead negotiator Kevin Roberts, rarely chief executive James Sutherland and never chairman David Peever. For the ACA, it might be a statement, or chief executive Alistair Nicholson, or on special occasions president Greg Dyer. For variations, a player or two will speak up. They don't have much else to do.
This week, invited by media, former ACA head Paul Marsh chimed in. You could say it was none of his business, but he did successfully negotiate the last deal, and he has just negotiated a deal for the AFL players. He has moral authority.
At the toss, the choice was between "revenue-sharing" and "not revenue-sharing". You might argue that they are two sides of the same coin. AFL chairman Richard Goyder did, saying that however much players were paid, by whatever device, it could be represented as a percentage of the game's revenue. The idea amused him. Now that the AFL deal was done, he could afford to laugh.
Goyder used to run Wesfarmers. Peever used to run Rio Tinto. It was never this hard.
There is plenty of fine print if you want to read it. But this is where we come to the Turnbull-Shorten axis. We are not talking about fitters and turners here, nor firemen and nurses. We are talking about professional sportsmen (oh, and just now, women).
So here's how it looks from the stands (OK, press box). CA makes plenty of money. The cricketers are getting plenty of money. At a times when wages are flat, and discretionary spending low, whether a state cricketer gets $200,000 or $250,000 a year is neither here nor there. In fact, it's way over yonder.
I know all the pros and cons. I've been hearing them for two years now, from footballers and cricketers. There is an archive of emails in the cloud somewhere. Combing through them, twitches of movement can be discerned. The ACA said it would modify its position on revenue streams. CA said it to broaden its offer. This is exactly what they should be talking about behind closed doors.
The AFL deal was done only on Tuesday  but what do you remember about it, the nuance about revenue streams and margins, or that footballers get an immediate 20 per cent pay rise and your club $2 million more to play with next season? Thought so.
So CA and the ACA need to get going now, one batting, one bowling. It is still footy season, but even if they thrash out a deal this weekend, the red tape is piled up and if there is any intimation that this imbroglio will interfere in any way Australia's preparedness for the Ashes this summer, they might find the cricket public storming both their ramparts.
Or worse, not caring enough any more to storm them.
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