Australian cricket's warring parties continue their snail-like march towards peace after chiefs James Sutherland and Alistair Nicholson met in Melbourne.
Cricket Australia (CA) insist pay talks have not broken down, expressing hope they will formally resume on Monday or Tuesday.
The Australian Cricketers' Association (ACA) are also upbeat the week will bring progress, suggesting there is a lot of work remaining and one-on-one talks between the chief executives must continue.
Sutherland and Nicholson had a chance to thrash out their differences in a long meeting on Sunday.
It's understood it was a cordial chat that inched the two parties slightly closer to a resolution. CA is in the process of redrafting some documents as negotiations continue.
The national women's side, who were playing the World Cup thanks to short-term deals, recently joined more than 200 state and international players in becoming unemployed.
The previous Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) expired at the end of the financial year, with CA and ACA deadlocked over the issue of revenue sharing.
If there is no meaningful progress in the impasse then next month's Test tour of Bangladesh will be scrapped, while this summer's Ashes could be affected.
The governing body and union were both remaining mute on specifics of what Sutherland and Nicholson discussed on Sunday but a frank email from the ACA to players would no doubt have been raised.
"Cricket Australia will not comment on details of the negotiation but productive discussions were held today and progress is being made on a range of issues," a CA spokesperson said.
"We have been in constant communication with the ACA and we are expecting further meetings on the negotiation to continue over the coming days."
Both parties have indicated they want the saga to play out in private.
CA remain perplexed by Nicholson's email to players, which entered the public domain on Saturday.
"ACA continues to do all we can to sensibly break this impasse," Nicholson wrote to players.
"On Thursday night the ACA received draft legal wording removing any reference to 'revenue share' in a proposed new Article 5 of the next MoU.
"This was unexpected. It has setback negotiations and thwarted the prospects of agreement.
"The ACA will seek clarification on this as a matter of priority ...these actions would have the effect of taking the negotiations back to 'square one' minimising the good work and good faith acquired over the last two weeks and again jeopardising upcoming tours."
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