Published: Jun 03, 2025, 04:16 PM (IST)
Edited: Jun 03, 2025, 04:16 PM (IST)
Todd Greenberg, the CEO of Cricket Australia (CA), has said that he is hoping on giving a memorable send-off to Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli if the duo plays in Australia for one last time this year. As the star players have retired from Tests and T20I within the last 12 years, they will now only play One-Day matches for India.
India are set to tour Australia for a three-math ODIs in Perth, Adelaide and Sydney from October 19 to 25. The one-Day series will be followed by a five-match T20I series from October 29 to November 8. In an Australian home summer headlined by the five-match Ashes, the Indian interest looms large with the women’s team also slated to tour the country for a multi-format series after WPL 2026 is over.
“It’s a massive summer of cricket highlighted by both the Indian women’s and men’s teams. Also the Ashes is here, and for the first time in nearly two decades, Australian cricket will be playing international matches in every single capital city and territory across the entire country, which is amazing when you think about the logistical exercise that goes with that. But to answer the question, look, there’s a lot of work in bespoke marketing plans for every game in every city. Some of those will be nuanced to local markets, whether we’re playing, like in far North Queensland when South Africa are here or in our big cities when both Indian men’s and women’s are here. So a lot of work going into that,” said Greenberg, while replying to a query from IANS, in a virtual interaction on Tuesday.
As CA have announced that they have officially recorded that they have recorded their highest individual day of ticket sales when they opened up it’s priority pre-sale windows on Tuesday and one will surely expect the fans in Australia and the overseas spectators will get their money’s worth when the India tour and Ashes takes place.
“I think we saw real momentum last year on the back of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy series – some record-breaking numbers on ticket sales. I anticipate that we’ll see a number of sellouts across the summer, really starting in August, and going through to March. So this may be a summer like we’ve never seen before with the amount of content that we have. If you think about the quality of the players that will be coming, particularly from India, this might be the last time that we get to see Virat Kohli or Rohit Sharma play in our country. If that is the case, but who knows, it might not be. But if it is, we want to make sure we give them a great send-off, which is a reflection of the incredible contribution they’ve made to international cricket,” added Greenberg, who previously served as the chief of the Australian Cricketers Association (ACA).
India last toured Australia for Border-Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) 2024-25, where they played 5 Test matches. Australia were the winner of the series 3-1. Rohit Sharma was the captain of the team in the first 4 matches, and he stepped down for the final match of the series. Jasprit Bumrah took the leadership role for the final match, but he had to then leave the field mid-match, where Virat Kohli had to take the leadership duty.
(Written with inputs from IANS)
