Cricket Australia say the new deal will see more cricket on free-to-air television than ever before

Cricket Australia has put a tough couple of weeks behind it with a massive new $1.2 billion TV rights deal, which puts ODIs and T20 Internationals behind a pay wall for the first time. The joint bid between free-to-air operator Seven West Media and pay-TV's Foxtel divides up coverage of all forms of men's and women's cricket over six years and is double the previous $600 million rights package with the Nine Network. However, the move to take the 50-over One Day and T20 Internationals behind a pay wall faces significant regulatory hurdles. Both shorter forms of the international game are included in the Federal Government's anti-siphoning list, which requires that they be available on free-to-air television. Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland said he would be working through the regulatory requirements with the government. "One Day Internationals will be on Fox Sports and we are working with Fox Sports to come to a landing point for the regulatory requirements," Mr Sutherland said. "Certainly the [communications] minister is aware of it." Mr Sutherland said the important point was there would be more cricket than ever on free-to-air television. "The amount of cricket across Foxtel and Seven, the amount of free-to-air cricket is greater than ever before — there is a commitment to women's cricket, Tests, 23 women's big bash league matches[will now be covered]", Mr Sutherland said. "We will have more content on television over the next 5 years than ever before. "Some of this is a significant uplift in revenue, but we have balanced that with an increased amount of cricket being made available to the public," Mr Sutherland said.