Pat Cummins and Travis Head reportedly turned down mouth-watering deals to quit Australian cricket to play in franchise T20 tournaments year-round. According to The Age, the Aussie duo was informally approached by an IPL franchise with an offer of 10 million dollars each annually (INR 58.2 crore approx.) to represent it in various T20 franchise tournaments.
The publication further reported that both Cummins and Head remain committed to playing international cricket for Australia. However, this has given a further push to privatise the Big Bash League – Australia’s flagship T20 cricket league – in order to invite private capital that would bolster players’ salaries.
As per the report, discussions regarding this have taken place between Cricket Australia, the state associations, and the players’ union. However, there has been no official word from any of the parties involved thus far.
Former IPL franchise Sunrisers Hyderabad retained the Australia Test and ODI captain for Rs 18 crore ahead of the mega auctions last year. He was originally signed by the franchise for a whopping Rs 20.5 crore at the IPL auction in 2024 before taking a pay cut last year. The ODI World Cup winner is also SRH captain.
According to The Age, the top Aussie cricketers usually pocket around 1.5 million Australian dollars (INR 8.74 crore approx.) each per year. However, Cummins, who besides being one of Australia’s leading pacers, is also their Test and ODI captain, takes home around 3 million Australian dollars (INR 17.48 crore approx.) when his captaincy stipend is taken into account.
Head, a big-hitting top-order batter, was signed by SRH for Rs 6.8 crore at the IPL 2024 auction. However, thanks to his rising stocks, his salary more than doubled for the 2025 season as he was retained for Rs 14 crore.
In comparison with fellow Aussie stars, the salaries paid to the country’s top cricketers appear minuscule.
Formula 1 driver Oscar Piastri currently tops the list of highest-paid Australian sports stars with McLaren paying him around 40 million Australian dollars, followed by NBA’s Josh Giddey who pockets around 38 million Australian dollars, while NFL’s Jordan Mailata completes the top three with a salary of 34 million Australian dollars.
