Heath Mills has helped transform the sport during his 25 years in the role of chief executive of the New Zealand Cricket Players Association.
And there is more change in the pipeline.
But this time, it will be someone else in the hot seat advocating for the players.
Earlier this week, Mills announced he was stepping down.
His last day in the role will be in June.
Mills will not disappear completely. He will continue to work in cricket through his position as executive chairman of the World Cricketers’ Association,
He will also remain involved with the NZCPA in a project management capacity during the next 18 months to help oversee negotiations for the next master agreement.
"I think it’s the right call and it’s been coming for a while," Mills told the Otago Daily Times.
"I’ve been doing this job since 2000-2001 and the CPA feels like my fifth limb.
"I’ve been blessed to do it and I’ve been humbled to work for players.
"Leaving has not been easy, but I think it’s the right thing for me and I think it’s the right time for the association.
"I want to spend more time globally supporting players, so I just couldn’t really continue to do both."
During his tenure, the NZCPA developed a range of initiatives to support players, including the retirement fund and the cricketers’ hardship trust.
Mills has also been a strong advocate for the growth and professionalisation of the women’s game. He pushed for equal match fees — introduced in 2022 — which paved the way for more women to pursue the sport as a career.
The players set the organisation three goals initially. They wanted a fairer share of the income generated by the sport. They wanted better grounds and training facilities, and they wanted more support for past players.
"Setting up the cricketers’ hardship trust ... has probably resulted in some of the more rewarding things I’ve been involved with.
"I think that trust supports between 20 to 25 past players a year now, with all sorts of difficulties that they may find themselves in.
"We are housing some and paying for operations for others.
"People have issues in their lives, sometimes not of their making, sometimes perhaps of their making. But the trust supports them without fear or favour and it’s been really awesome to be able to help people in times of need."
"So in all honesty, if I look back, it’s the work of a hardship trust that gives me the greatest pride in what we do to support people."
Mills’ contribution to the sport was recognised when he was awarded the Bert Sutcliffe Medal — New Zealand cricket’s highest honour for services to the game — in 2022.
Friend and foe
He has, in many ways, been both friend and foe to New Zealand Cricket. He sat across the table from the national body and advocated strongly for the players.
Those sorts of negotiations can get tense. But by improving the conditions for the players, he has helped create the professional environment that has allowed the national teams to flourish and consistently punch above their weight.
"I look at the sport and it’s come a long way.
"The growth of cricket is phenomenal, and I’ve been very fortunate to stand alongside players and experience that growth first-hand.
"When we started, there was no T20 cricket and now we have some of the biggest sports franchise leagues in the world in cricket.
"Cricket’s growing in non-traditional areas. I’m a big test cricket advocate, but the growth of the sport is in T20 franchise cricket."
That growth brings complications. T20 franchises are demanding more and more of their players and that presents challenges for the international game, which has seemingly been relegated.
Mills puts the blame on administrators for not being able to get together and carve out a suitable playing window.
Some see T20 as a usurper who has taken the throne that test cricket once occupied.
Mills sees T20 more as a saviour than a slayer.
"If you look at the growth in the sport, it’s in those leagues. More kids and fans engage in those leagues.
"I think that’s because they go for four to eight weeks, they have a start point, they have an end point, there’s a final, they become tribal, they’re easy to follow.
"ICC events are also very, very popular because they have a start point and an end point, they go for four weeks, they’re easy to follow.
"[But] international cricket is a struggle for fans and young people because there’s just a collection of series that often don’t have a lot of context and meaning other than the individual match in and of itself.
"Unfortunately, the member boards haven’t come together and allowed the ICC to agree on an international programme that makes sense and that works well and is regulated centrally.
More structure wanted
"Everyone just does their own thing and I don’t think that’s helped international cricket. I’d love to see there be more structure to the international programme."
The big challenge for his successor is to help ensure New Zealand cricket remains relevant.
He thinks the push to privatise T20 in New Zealand is a step in the right direction. It is what the players are telling him they want.
"We now regularly don’t see 25-odd of our best players playing it because they’re either playing international cricket or they’re off on casual agreements at that time of year.
"We’ve even had some of our best domestic players opt out of contracts and playing the Super Smash. So some of the feedback we get from players is that the standard isn’t what it was.
"So I think we’ve got some challenges and we need to recognise them. And if we can get a privatised comp here, which has worked everywhere around the world in much smaller markets than New Zealand, we will get a lot more investment.
"We will get a lot more fan engagement as a result.
"There’s no secret sauce. It’s pretty straightforward stuff.
"I think if you’re inspiring young kids because of what they see in front of them, then the sport’s going to be healthy because they’ll want to play and engage in it."
