Summer south of the equator means cricket. When the sun reaches its annual solstice and the jet stream drifts north, the game traditionally follows. After a feast of action in the Northern Hemisphere, it becomes the turn of those below the equator to take centre stage. For Australians in 2025, that means the Ashes, as cricket fans Down Under get to enjoy five Test matches over a sweltering summer.
A festive season of contrasts in the Southern Hemisphere
If the Ashes betting odds are anything to go by, then it should also be a long summer of celebrations for Australians, with Pat Cummins’ men at just 4/6 to win the series.
Tellingly, the latest Ashes cricket odds on the correct series score price a 5–0 whitewash for Australia at just 11/2. The only shorter odds for both teams as far as the correct series score goes is 4–1 for Australia at a price of 5/1. In short, all the signs point toward a very satisfying home series for Australian fans.
However, not every country in the Southern Hemisphere will be basking in summer cricket. South Africa will not host any Test matches over the warmer months, the first time this has happened since the nation’s return from sporting isolation in 1991.
What makes the decision even harder to fathom is that the Proteas are the current test world champions after beating Australia at Lord’s in June.
There will be no homecoming and no chance to celebrate with their fans after climbing to the summit of the men’s game.
How did it come to this?
Cricket South Africa (CSA) has pointed to a packed international schedule, stadium renovations ahead of the 2027 ODI World Cup, and the priority of the SA20. The domestic T20 league has been moved forward to start on Boxing Day and will run until late January, overlapping the traditional Test window. Once it ends, a five-match T20I series against the West Indies will take place in February.
That scheduling makes the reasoning about stadium renovations only partly convincing. If the venues are ready for the SA20, why not for Test cricket? The reality seems less about logistics and more about where priorities lie. CSA has increasingly built its calendar around the commercial pull of the SA20, a competition backed by private investment and broadcast money. In the process, the game’s longest format has been pushed aside.
CSA insists it has the “utmost respect” for Test cricket, a defence issued after fielding a weakened squad for a two-match series in New Zealand while the SA20 was in full swing. Yet those assurances sound increasingly hollow when the scheduling itself leaves no room for the format they claim to value most.
Silence Where There Should Be Sound
It paints a bleak picture. On Boxing Day, the floodlights will be on and the music blaring for the start of the SA20, but the turnstiles that once welcomed Test crowds will stay shut. There will be no Cape Town roar for the New Year’s Test and no familiar sight of Kagiso Rabada thundering in with the second new ball as a Highveld storm builds behind the Corlett Drive End at the Wanderers. South African cricket has known quiet winters before, but a summer without the red ball feels different.
For a country that once measured itself by its toughness over five days, this will not just be a scheduling gap. It will be a hollow summer, one that underlines how even champions can be left waiting when the balance between heritage and profit is lost.