![\"Saffioti](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/0eeb005216a7d1bc1e1b852b88c9309f3f13242c.jpg\")
Camera IconSaffioti is confident of a strong crowd. Credit: Stuart Quinn\/The West Australian<\/p>\nSports Minister Rita Saffioti is confident a strong crowd will flock to Optus Stadium to see Australia take on New Zealand in the first Test of the home summer, despite the game being fixtured to begin on a Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Australia\u2019s series against the Black Caps will come in the midst of a jam-packed run of fixtures for the side, leaving only a tight window for it to be played.<\/p>\n
A start date of Wednesday, December 9 means if this year\u2019s contest in Perth runs for only two days \u2014 as the opening Test of the Ashes did last summer \u2014 it will not reach the weekend.<\/p>\n
Speaking 50 days out from the start of the Perth Test on Tuesday, Saffioti said the game had attracted plenty of interest from local, interstate and international fans.<\/p>\n
\u201cOf course we want to have it mainly over the weekend, so we\u2019ll see how we go,\u201d Saffioti said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWest Australians love their Test cricket. We\u2019ve seen it on weekdays be packed out.<\/p>\n
Camera IconSaffioti is confident of a strong crowd. Credit: Stuart Quinn\/The West Australian<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat you\u2019ll find is a lot of people will take leave, other people will make arrangements to get here, so we expect some good attendances, because Test cricket has made a huge comeback.\u201d<\/p>\n
December\u2019s Test will mark the completion of a three-year agreement between the State Government and Cricket Australia ensuring the first red-ball game of the summer has been staged in Perth.<\/p>\n
Saffioti said the State Government had \u201cput forward a strong case\u201d to continue the arrangement.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re negotiating with Cricket Australia now. We\u2019ve been very proactive on this,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn particular, our location makes it very sensible to (host) the first Test. Not that you can always guarantee weather, but I do believe our weather is a much better prospect than Brisbane at that time of year.\u201d<\/p>\n
As has been the case in the last two years, an interactive fan festival will be staged outside Optus Stadium as the Test match is played.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sports Minister Rita Saffioti is confident a strong crowd will flock to Optus Stadium to see Australia take…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":934746,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,56117,740,588,85],"class_list":["post-934745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australian-cricket-team","tag-cricket","tag-sport","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/934745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=934745"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/934745\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/934746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=934745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=934745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=934745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}