Nearly a decade after Cricket Australia sold the naming rights of its century-old domestic competition to a commercial sponsor, tradition has won out.
Cricket Australia on Wednesday announced the Sheffield Shield would return as the showpiece trophy to be contested by the six states during the domestic first-class season after an absence of nine years, during which the competition was sponsored by a milk company and renamed the Pura Cup.
The "Shield" will still have a presenting sponsor - a cereal company - and the change will no doubt please the Australian Broadcasting Corp., whose radio and television announcers continued to refer to the 'Shield' throughout the period.
"Cricket Australia is passionate about bringing back the history and tradition of the Sheffield Shield ..." Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland said.
The shield, bought with a donation to the states from Lord Sheffield in 1892, was contested for every season from then until 1999, when the then Australian Cricket Board decided to find a naming rights sponsor to compensate for the losses incurred annually by a competition played in front of sparse crowds.
