Net Gains 2023: Caitlin Bassett says Netball pay deal must emulate cricket

Former Diamonds captain Caitlin Bassett fears netball needs to make a change to ensure it does not lose the next generation of players to other sports.

Former Diamonds captain Caitlin Bassett has called for the next Collective Player Agreement (CPA) to include a revenue split arrangement to allow Super Netball players to share the spoils if they help to grow the game.

Bassett, who now works for NSW Cricket as player development manager for the female programs, has seen first hand the incredible growth in wages for women in her new sport.

The memorandum of understanding announced less than a fortnight ago between Cricket Australia (CA) and the Australian Cricketers’ Association (ACA) will leave women featuring in both the domestic Women’s National Cricket League and the Women’s Big Bash League, earing just over $151,000 per year, on average.

It’s a massive jump in wages for a sport whose female athletes sat slightly behind netball as the best paid domestic players after Netball Australia (NA) and the Australian Netball Players’ Association (ANPA) finalised their last deal in 2021.

“It is amazing,” Bassett said of the cricketers’ deal.

Gretel Bueta and Caitlin Bassett back in their international days

“I sat in the meeting where the girls were talked to by the ACA about their new MOU and … talking about some of the minimums or average wages and my jaw dropped.

“I was looking around the room at some of the young players in the group and their eyes were wide.

“I just think about how exciting it is for them and knowing that if they continue working hard in the game that their minimum (wage) is going to look like around $70,000 and if they make it to the Australian team and get a CA contract, they’re set for life.

“It’s a pretty great thing.”

HOW IT ALL STARTED

The remuneration is a far cry from Bassett’s first professional netball contract with the Perth Orioles (now West Coast Fever), where she signed on for $50.

Even as captain of the Australian team, Bassett’s earnings were roughly on par with what the cricketers’ minimum wage will now be.

Cricket’s wage growth has come largely on the back of a 27.5 per cent revenue share, agreed to in 2017, and it’s something that Bassett believes netball needs to look at to ensure it does not lose the next generation of players to other sports as the range and reward of competitors continues to grow.

Bassett fears that’s happening already though.

“There’s lots of netballers who aren’t getting opportunities or getting what they need in the sport and there’s more opportunities and now more money in other sports for them to go to - there’s also Olympic pathways in other sports,” she said.

Captain Caitlin Bassett wants to see vast improvements for players in the next CPA

Netball Australia has been up front about its perilous financial position and is proposing to roll over the existing CPA later this year without any rises.

Bassett said it was impossible to compare sports in terms of what each could afford to pay their athletes.

But comparing the models used could be useful.

“Cricket Australia have a rev(enue) share model, which actually respects the fact that the players are huge stakeholders within their games and they’re working together (with the administration).

“As players and talking to ANPA, that’s something we want to push for with Netball Australia.

“A rev share model, I think, is the way going forward. It’s not the players wanting to take all the money and bankrupt the game, that’s absolutely not what it’s about.

“It’s all about working together and how everyone can grow the game and it being fair.

“If there’s no growth there, there’s no increase to (the players’) bottom line.

“So it’s in everyone’s best interest and it’s really incentivising players to help grow the game.”