Several T20 stars were overlooked in the inaugural BBL Draft.
Platinum players Faf du Plessis, Andre Russell, Kieron Pollard, Dwayne Bravo and Jason Roy were all snubbed as BBL clubs prioritised availability with their overseas signings.
Cricket Australia used the likes of du Plessis and Russell as marketing tools when promoting the draft and the tournament itself which is scheduled to start in December.
SEN host Gerard Whateley says the way the draft unfolded exposed the BBL’s “chronic identity crisis”.
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“I sat through the BBL Draft last night, the longer it went, the bigger disaster I thought it became,” Whateley told SEN’s Whateley.
“Chronic identity crisis surrounding the BBL vividly played out before us – is it entertainment or is it elite competition?
“Because quite rightly those who were building their teams are in it to win it, but the broadcast was all set up around the entertainment.
“The very first image was Faf du Plessis and the whole conversation revolved around Andre Russell, and it seemed from the second pick onwards, and the longer it went, the more you realised they’re not going to get drafted.
“It feels to me like had there been no draft all of du Plessis, ‘Dre Russ’, Kieron Pollard, Dwayne Bravo, Jason Roy would’ve been here for a few games, but by imposing the draft and the $340,000 guaranteed, they actually cost themselves the big names that they were after.
“Because they were paying Faf to be the marketing guy, Ben Horne wrote that, and I thought, ‘Oh my goodness, that shows you the failure right at the heart of it all’.
News Corp cricket writer Robert Craddock understands West Indian all-rounder Russell was also on a marketing contract with Cricket Australia.
Russell, Pollard and du Plessis would have only been available for the first half of BBL|12 before flying off to T20 competitions in the UAE and South Africa.
“They didn’t see this coming, Cricket Australia,” Craddock said.
“I understand Andre Russell was also on a marketing contract.
“I didn’t mind that at all. You’ve got a new concept … I don’t think the contracts were overly substantial, but they were there.
“They misread it, particularly with du Plessis, given all the threads of the South African Test summer.
“The moment when I knew that that there’s something fundamentally flawed with it was in the reviews last night after it and most clubs said, ‘We got what we want’.
“Well, if you got what you want and you didn’t get du Plessis, Pollard or Russell, who were there for sale, then it’s a broken system, it didn’t work.”
Whateley said further: “The people in the room last night recruited the names to build successful lists and win, but if you were watching the broadcast, it was all leveraged around the return of the big names to the BBL.
“And on that front, they ended up with egg on their face.
“The question is will Phil Salt, Alex Hales, Adam Hose, Liam Livingstone and Colin Munro sell tickets? Will they get you into the stands? I suspect they won’t.
“They’ll make the cricket better and will you follow your team more if they’re winning? And that’s the identity crisis that holds the BBL and has done for years and which I thought played out as graphically as ever in what transpired last night.”
The Melbourne Renegades selected big-hitting Englishman Livingstone with the first pick overall in Sunday night’s draft.