Aussie star Usman Khawaja says cricket’s top brass should stop scheduling matches on Australia Day

Star Test opener Usman Khawaja is happy to play cricket on January 26 but says it’s not the right date to be celebrating Australia Day.

The 2023-24 summer of cricket will include a pink-ball, day-night Test between Australia and the West Indies starting at the Gabba on January 25.

Indigenous women’s cricket star Ash Gardner has slammed the scheduling, saying it wasn’t ‘appropriate’ to be playing sport on a ‘day of mourning’.

‘I see sport as a celebration and entertainment and an event you want to go to,’ Gardner said on Sunday.

‘Why does there need to be something that represents something that’s quite morbid?’

Usman Khawaja said he has no problem with playing cricket on Australia Day, but believes the celebration should be held on a different day 

Australia star Ashleigh Gardner said on Monday it wasn’t ‘appropriate’ for Australia to be playing sport on a ‘day of mourning’

Pakistan-born Khawaja, who moved to Australia as a child with his family, said he did not ‘have an issue’ with playing on January 26.

However, he called for Australia Day to be celebrated on a different date.

‘We should celebrate it on a day that caters for all parts of Australia, and I’m big on that in Australian cricket too,” he said.

‘You’ve got First Nations people, we’ve got myself [who are] immigrants who’ve come to Australia.

‘We do need to look at it. I think it doesn’t matter when you celebrate Australia Day – the reasons you’re celebrating Australia Day are more important.

‘You’re celebrating for Australia, celebrating for you, celebrating for me, celebrating it for First Nations people, celebrating for all the multicultural communities we have across Australia.

‘We’re all immigrants here, other than First Nations people, so for me, Australia Day is a beautiful day and I honestly believe it should be celebrated on another day.’

Gardner previously condemned the scheduling of a women’s T20 international against Pakistan on January 26 this year.

The Aussie star is a proud Muruwari woman, whose mother and ancestors come from north-western New South Wales and spoke out against Australia Day earlier this year 

Australia are scheduled to face the West Indies in a day-night Test at the Gabba on Australia Day next year, with the Test starting on  January 25

The 26-year-old said it could put Indigenous men’s player Scott Boland in a similarly uncomfortable position and noted it would be difficult to get an elder to deliver a Welcome to Country.

‘I said my opinion [this year] and I told the people that it mattered to,’ she told News Corp.

‘For this to happen again but just to the men’s side […] I guess there’s certainly disappointment around it.

‘I just don’t understand why this one day of the year – which is a day of mourning, which doesn’t have a very good history of what happened on that day, that there needs to be cricket.

‘It’s probably not overly appropriate.’

Gardner is pictured with late cricket pioneer Faith Thomas in 2017. Thomas was the first Indigenous woman to represent her country in any sport

Cricket Australia scheduling manager Peter Roach cited a tight summer schedule and noted the governing body’s National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Cricket Advisory Committee (NATSICAC) had been consulted and supported the schedule.

‘We really respect Ash’s opinion and understand for many Australians and Indigenous Australians, especially that that’s a day that has different meanings,’ he told reporters.

‘What we do know is that we’ve got a really tight schedule where we need to fit lots of games in and we make those decisions with all those factors taken into account and try to make it work for us.’