When the dust finally settles on the negotiations between New Zealand Cricket and the New Zealand Cricket Players' Association (NZCPA), the Player's approach will be a textbook example of how not to run a dispute.

The NZCPA has shown itself to be a genuine new boy on the industrial block - but its demand, that New Zealand Cricket fund its operation is naivete personified and is symptomatic of why it has failed to win friends and influence people.

A quote from the Players' document to yesterday's meeting of the parties noted: "There is no allocation for CPA funding, insurance cover or for any professional development programme."

Hard-bitten, committed unionists will be falling about laughing at the ridiculousness of this situation.

While those unionists might think there is probably merit in the utopian notion of having employers pay union fees, and all the union's costs, presumably with an open cheque book, they would also appreciate that a position of independence from the parent body is the most basic requirement of any union that hopes for a degree of freedom in running its own affairs, and setting its own policies and practices.

But this whole issue has been one of the players being removed from reality of life in the industrial world. Not many unionists get paid for facing up to the fastest bowlers in the world, but they do know something about battling for their rights in every day work situations.

Joe Public, who willingly pays out of his own pocket for his union cover, will be wondering what the cricketers are on about.

And he will certainly be wondering at their tactics.

Was it really necessary for players to withdraw their services for the month of October at such an early stage of negotiations?

Did they not foresee the prospect that New Zealand Cricket would look to lay open the books in terms of player payments?

Did the players' representatives really believe they could win a situation in mediation when claiming New Zealand Cricket's chief executive Martin Snedden had breached a bargaining protocol when he released his own papers?

In a world more attuned to dealing with professional sporting payments than in the past, the payments the players received, and their request for more, could hardly have been expected to swing public support in behind them.

Apart from the basic fact that no self-respecting union-affiliated employee would ever want his union to be within shouting distance of his employer, the claim for payment by the game's governing body smacks of stupefying insensitivity to their very own case.

It is not as if the cricketers have the greatest of winning records, especially in the money-earning side of the game, the One-Day Internationals.

Joe Public will certainly be querying the strength of the players' convictions.

Industrial action involves sacrifice by the greater number for the longer term good.

By being tied to the employers' purse strings, the NZCPA clearly want their cake baked for them and to eat it every day, now and forever, at New Zealand Cricket's on-going expense.

There is an issue of credibility here, but this fact seems to have escaped the NZCPA.

If nothing else, the genuine commitment to improving the players' lot would carry a great deal more strength in the public sector, if players were paying their own costs out of their own pockets to meet the expenses incurred in the negotiating processes.

And it is to be wondered, if the players' do not succeed in their aims, will they suddenly find themselves facing a bill of considerable expense? Presumably this will be shared equally, meaning the players at the upper end of the payments will be paying the same as the players at the lower end.

Fair enough to have a disagreement with your employer, and fair enough that you should be looking for greater support for players on the lower end of the scale.

But how about some genuine meaning to the depth of concern?

It should be remembered that while the players have withdrawn their services for the month of October, they have still been turning up to their employers' facilities to practice, many of the players have still been fulfilling their duties as coaching officers, and presumably still being paid for the work.

Seemingly they feel there is no clash of interests here.

The more this goes on, the more it seems like a Clayton's dispute, the dispute you are having when you are not really having a dispute.

The degree of benevolence shown by New Zealand Cricket and the Major Associations toward the players in this issue is considerable.

In a normal industrial dispute, workers wouldn't dare even contemplate going near their employers' facilities. It would be like crossing a picket line.

By the same token, the employers could have locked the players out of their facilities and denied them their practice opportunities.

That this hasn't happened, is probably because the employers, New Zealand Cricket are conscious of the need to have players shaping up on November 1 to be in reasonable form for what is a crucial season ahead.

Clearly some lessons have been learned in this whole exercise. But it will take the players and their association a good deal of time to recover from the effects of this dispute.

And meantime, there's a fair chance the details of the Players' Association negotiation process will be filling the "How not to ..." textbooks at industrial relations colleges all over the country.

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