New South Wales has been elected champions of the Sheffield Shield following the cancellation of the final during the coronavirus pandemic.

In a development that had actually been going on for a few days after the suspension of the final round of matches, Cricket Australia announced the decision on Tuesday when they also “strongly advised” the cancelation of cricket at all levels while closing their offices too.

Cricket Australia Chief Speaks To Media About The Decision Making:

Speaking in Melbourne on Tuesday, Cricket Australia chief executive said their decision had been made easier by the substantial lead in the table from New South Wales.

“As we assessed it prior to the Shield final, there were a lot of questions, where are we going to play the final, if we don’t play the final is postponed, don’t you declare a winner,” he said. 

“I think it would have been beneficial because we were still fighting to win the Shield after round nine of the six states, which was brilliant, we had 12 points at the top of the table in New South Wales, so credit to New South Wales to be open that probably made our decision a little easier because they had such a gap on the field.” As for CA’s advice to abandon playing cricket, Roberts said. “I am aware that there were a lot of cricket clubs around the country in the 1800s, well before Cricket Australia was founded. They have been led over that very long period of time by very competent volunteer managers who are leaders of their communities. We have a responsibility to be consulted from the likes of government and other experts and then provide guidance and suggestions, but it is the job of those leaders who we trust and have trusted for well over 100 years in some cases to make the right decisions for their communities on the basis of their guidance just as we try to do more generally for cricket.”

Cricket Australia Staff To Work Remotely In Co-ordination:

All staff at Cricket Australia will now work remotely until further notice. Although at the end of the Australian season the big impact of the coronavirus pandemic had struck – forcing the scrubbing of the last two Chappell-Hadlee ODIs when New Zealand was forced to return home due to tighter travel restrictions, which also meant postponing Australia’s T20I tour – this did not seem to be a short-term problem.

CA’s next major decisions will include deciding on their players at the IPL if the tournament goes ahead then Bangladesh tours in June and England tours in July.