Australia’s men set for busiest summer of cricket with 27 fixtures planned

Two years of Covid postponements and a Twenty20 World Cup have handed Australia’s cricketers the busiest summer in the country’s history. Cricket Australia confirmed a cluttered schedule on Monday, with 27 men’s fixtures beginning with the first Top End tour since 2008 in August and September.

West Indies and South Africa will visit for Test series, while the former will join New Zealand and Zimbabwe in playing catch-up white ball series before the home T20 World Cup that was originally slated for 2020.

Early-season cricket will be played in in Townsville and Cairns against Zimbabwe and New Zealand respectively, before Australia leave for a three-match Twenty20 series in India.

West Indies and England then play white-ball series either side of the October-November Twenty20 World Cup, with England to be coached by Australia’s former women’s mentor Matthew Mott.

Notably, the Test summer begins in Perth on 30 November against West Indies, before a pink-ball Test in Adelaide from 8 December. Brisbane hosts the first Test against South Africa on 17 December, before Melbourne and Sydney hold the traditional Boxing Day and New Years’ Tests.

It marks a shift away from the Gabba hosting the first Test of the summer. Cricket Australia head of operations and scheduling Peter Roach highlighted a desire to beam the first two Tests into the east coast in prime-time.

“We also know the Gabba’s going to be offline for a couple of years,” he said. “Taking the chance to look at some different opportunities when we’ve got the chance to us makes a bit of sense. We’ve got a very good record in Perth too. Moving away from fortress Gabba is not something that scares us.”

The figure of 27 matches for the men does not include any T20 World Cup