Ashleigh Gardner slams scheduling of Australia game on 26 January, CA responds

Ashleigh Gardner, an indigenous Australian member of the Australian national women’s cricket team has condemned a decision to play a T20I against Pakistan on Australia’s national day. The holiday on 26 January commemorates the arrival in 1788 of the “first fleet” which brought first white settlers to Australia.

But some indigenous Australians commemorate the day as Invasion Day or Colonization Day because the arrivals set in motion the seizure of lands and the diminution of the indigenous Australian culture.

“Unfortunately this year the Australian women’s cricket team has been scheduled to play a game on the 26th of Jan which certainly doesn’t sit well with me as an individual but also all the people I’m representing,” Gardner tweeted.

“For those who don’t have a good understanding of what that day means it was the beginning of genocide, massacres and dispossession.”