Brisbane Mayor raises prospect of international cricket at Breakfast Creek precinct

Brisbane Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner has identified where international cricket matches could be played when the Gabba undergoes its massive redevelopment.

Will cricket fans soon enjoy a coldie at the Brekky Creek before making their way across the road to see Kohli battle it out with Starc and Cummins at Allan Border Field?

Brisbane Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner has raised the prospect of the Breakfast Creek precinct, which includes Allan Border Oval, being used for international matches while the Gabba is redeveloped for the 2032 Olympics.

“Cricket will have to go somewhere while the Gabba is being redeveloped over that four-year period,” Schrinner said at a Property Council lunch at the Hilton. City Beat cricket spies tell us that while Allan Border Field could be used for some international matches, it was unlikely to have the seating capacity for something like a test match. The field only has a seating capacity of several thousand people with a test requiring at least 15,000 seats.

Cricketer AB de Villiers at Allan Border Field last year. Picture: Glenn Hunt

PARIS PINEAPPLE

Ted O’Brien, former baker and now Scott Morrison’s point man on the Brisbane Olympics, calls a spade a spade. The Federal Member for Fairfax told the Property Council lunch that during a visit to Paris last year to look at venues for the 2024 Paris games he got the chance to promote one of Queensland’s most sacred sites. “We have the Eiffel Tower,” one of the Parisians boasted to O’Brien.”What do you have?” O’Brien didn’t miss a beat when he replied: “We are Queenslanders mate, we have the Big Pineapple. You could see everyone whipping out their iPhones to google what the Big Pineapple was.”

Our own Eiffel Tower ... the Big Pineapple.

WHAT A GAS

Japanese energy giant Iwatani Corp will open an office in Brisbane as its moves to take advantage of Queensland’s hydrogen export boom.

The office will be headed by Masaru Nishmura, the executive responsible for hydrogen development at the company, and comes as Japan starts to make big investments in a carbon neutral future. Last year, the State Government-owned Stanwell Corp formed a consortium with Iwatani to build a renewable hydrogen export facility in Gladstone.

Iwatani is not the only Japanese company looking at exporting hydrogen from Queensland, which now has its own Hydrogen Minister in the form of Mick De Brenni.

Itochu and Sumitomo also are looking at hydrogen projects in the state. De Brenni told a Queensland Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry function this week that the development of hydrogen markets in Australia will require a “space-race like effort.”

He says Queensland’s government-owned ports and electricity generators such as Stanwell will play a big role in the development of the market.

Hydrogen Minister Mick de Brenni

NOOSA BOUND

Mining types will be making a beeline for the Sunshine Coast next month for the next installment of the Noosa Mining Conference.

The theme of the conference to be held at Peppers Resort on November 10-12 is “unearthed” with some of the state’s top executives in the gold, energy and battery metals sectors set to make an appearance. They include Nick Jorss, of Bowen Coking Coal, Lake Resources Steve Promnitz, Diatreme Resources Neil McIntrye and Metallica boss Theo Psaros.

The now infamous drinks session on the second day of the conference, sponsored by richlister Steve Bizzell’s Bizzell Capital Partners, will no doubt result in some sore heads the next morning for the final day.

IN THE BUNKER

The end of year “hit and giggle” golf season is off and running and one of the early starters out of the blocks are the bosses who manage or run Queensland’s multi-billion dollar strata sector, covering apartments, units and townhouses.

Friday’s drizzly weather did not deter the tee-off from Brookwater Golf Club for the sector’s annual golf day, with one of the state’s leading strata lawyers, Jason Carlson, hosting one of the holes together with staff from Grace Lawyers.

Carlson thought there was more wisdom manning the refreshment tent on hole four which Grace sponsored, then going out and flogging some existing and potential new clients that might bob up during the hit out.

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