Australia vs New Zealand on Boxing Day: It’s a date!

Cricket Australia has announced its schedule for the upcoming summer, with some high-profile matches at home. The Australians will host Sri Lanka, Pakistan and New Zealand, while the women’s team will host Sri Lanka, India and England.

Australia’s summer will start with a 3-match T20I series against Sri Lanka from October 27 in Adelaide. The remainder of the two T20s will be held in Brisbane and Melbourne on October 30 and November 1 respectively.

This will be followed by a 3-match T20I series against Pakistan in Sydney, Canberra and Perth.

The Test matches will begin against Pakistan in Brisbane on November 21 with the second Test being a day-night affair in Adelaide from November 29.

After the conclusion of the Test series against Pakistan, Australia will then host a 3-match Test series against their Trans-Tasman rivals New Zealand from December 12 in a day-night affair at the Perth Stadium. The series will include a Boxing Day Test against their neighbours in Melbourne after a gap of 30 years. The traditional New Year’s Test will be again held in Sydney from January 3.

The summer will finally conclude in March after a 3-match ODI series against New Zealand which will be held between March 13-20.

Speaking on the home schedule, Peter Roach, CA head of cricket operations, said:

“Scheduling international cricket is challenging in that nine of the ten major cricketing countries have seasons similar to ours, so working with them to find space in the calendar to fulfil our obligations to the ICC Future Tours Program is a juggling act. The long-range Future Tours Program had three separate limited-overs series scheduled between India, New Zealand and Australia. When the countries started working through the detail, it was clear that there was not enough space for each series at the proposed times. Cricket Australia took the position that while January was our preference for these ODI matches, there are times we need to honour our commitments to work in the greater context of international cricket scheduling. We evaluated different options for an alternative and saw the most value in the March opportunity to extend our window in the traditional cricket season.”

Roach also commented on the importance of the matches which Australia will host:

“The Pakistan and New Zealand Tests will be the first matches played in Australia for ICC Test Championship points. The ICC Test Championship will give Test cricket greater context and make every match count with nine countries participating for the 2019-2021 title. The ODI series against New Zealand will also be significant as the last set of ODIs played at home before the ODI League begins in 2020. This league will serve as the part of the qualification process for the 2023 World Cup.”