No 137, Sept 17: The Grumbler's County Cricket Newsletter
🔴 Glorious Gloucs win it for Syd 🟣 Championship finish could be a classic, previews 🟢 Get letter writing 🟤 Fletcher to leave Notts 🔵 Key overseas players to miss finale 🟠 Sky to stymie Surrey
What a stunning week of county cricket.
Somerset turned over Surrey in the final few balls to take the Championship down to the wire. Archie Vaughan and Jack Leach took all 20 wickets at Taunton after Tom Banton’s hobbling heroics gave the hosts a chance. The Surrey strut disappeared as they went into their shell and were prised out at the death.
Then Gloucestershire, small, skint and likely to move home after a good century at Nevill Road, took their first T20 Blast title with their skilful yet starless team. Led by a talented coach who has inexplicably struggled to get jobs or even interviews in recent years. Actually, scratch that, it is very explicable. Watched on by a former hero, now President, a fierce fast bowler with a flailing action, sitting in his wheelchair due to the bastard that is Motor Neurone Disease.
Both games stirred emotions within me. And I was at home with no particular dog in either fight.
The last week has been the best advertisement for the county game. It showed all the drama, rivalry and meaning lacking in the tournament-that-shall-not-be-named.
You cannot shortcut this. It has been slowly baked into county cricket over the decades. We all knew of Vaughan senior, Lawrence, Alleyne, Gloucestershire’s one-day history, Somerset’s previous Championship failures, Surrey’s strength, the history of warm-up football injuries. That adds layers to the story. So does the very fact that a four-day game can crescendo in the final few balls.
The stories shine through despite the sidelining of county cricket.
As non-hosts, the chips will be stacked against the likes of Somerset and Gloucestershire in the next few years and decades. Do you really think David Payne, the player of the Blast, would be still in Bristol in the scenario to come? The only way would be if he is stockpiled by a host and loaned back to a non-host. But more likely he is farmed out from a mother IPL club to whichever of their franchises in whichever T20 League require him.
Major change is close. They will tell you it is a whole new ball game. In truth, it is just about making it ‘their ball’ now. And, like the worst playground brat, they will be able to do what they like with it.
There were reminders of a comparable seismic change in an interview with former Tottenham manager David Pleat, who has a new book out. He was in charge at White Hart Lane when the Premier League was created in the early 1990s. It was another money and power grab brought in behind the smokescreen of progress. Pleat’s chair was Alan Sugar.
“He told the Premier League chairmen the new TV money coming in would be like prune juice. He said they'd p*** it up the wall. And they did. He wanted them to cap salaries at 60 per cent and invest the rest in new academies and training centres."
I am no fan of Sugar. But this sort of self-sustainability is exactly what is preached as best practice in elite football now. However, greed took over and, dazzled by stars and sold by sizzle reels, we all went along with it.
The obscene money in Premier League football has covered its considerable ills but undoubtedly led to a much better stadia, star players and a great product. But the media money is running out, more games are being sold to keep the same revenue and those stars want their bumper contracts bumped up no matter what. So now the average ticket buyer in the top flight is 42 years-old and teams are chucking out season-ticket holders to make way for higher-yield tourist fans. The average top-flight team loses £40m a year. They have pushed back against the need for a football regulator (leaking some silly stories about the Euros this week). And yet, a case to hear the 115 charges against Man City started on Monday. It is being held in private at an undisclosed location. Six years too late.
At what point can we point out that the emperor has no clothes?
This is the moment to push back against a similar move in English cricket.
Don’t listen to the corporate commentators and star players. As George Dobell points out below, our administrators have let us down, quite clearly and obviously. It is shocking to me that so few in the cricket media have properly called them out.
It seems like very few people outside the fans are going to help here. And those who do care are pessimistic about their ability to change anything.
I get all that. Most of the time, I am too.
But, as an act of personal defiance or sheer bloody-mindedness, write to your MP and the DCMS. Add your name to this spreadsheet or send me an email by reply and I will send you some advice I have gathered by asking around.
Over the past fortnight, I have been getting numerous messages from concerned people I have never met. And talking to some prominent people in the game, I have got the impression this is not quite done.
A ‘direction of travel’ is not a detailed agreement. And that is where the devil lies.
However, for county cricket fans, the real devil is apathy and fatalism. Regular readers know I suffer from these myself.
But grumbling is what members do, right? Getting the ear of impatient executives is an innate behaviour. Often it is about the trivial and pointless.
This is the opposite.
So go write your letters, articulate your view, put your point across. Even if we only achieve a more equitable distribution of funds from this deceitful competition it would be a valuable win. If we get the MPs asking questions then it would be even better.
So, cause a little fuss.
As Muhammad Ali nearly said: “Grumble, old man*, grumble.”
*Yes, women too.
To clarify something I got rather confused last week re: distribution of Hundred money. (BTW Why are counties not making this crystal clear to their members, aka shareholders)
Distribution of the 49% - discussions over sales open now
A Telegraph article in May said “the first £275 million will be split equally between 19 clubs, the next £150 million will go only on the non-hosts and anything above that divided between the 19 again”. And that “if the ECB raises £400 million a non-host will receive a cash injection of £22 million. A host ground will land £14.5 million but with the power to sell its own 51 per cent stake.”
Distribution of the 51% - owned by host club. Can be sold, in part or its entirety, at a later date.
In a webinar to members, here’s how Essex broke down the distribution of a £50m sale for 51% of a franchise owned by host clubs.
Selling hosts get £40m (80 per cent of revenue)
Recreational game gets £5m (10 per cent of revenue)
Remaining 18 stakeholders take an equal share of the other £5m, £263k (10 per cent of revenue)
Very importantly hosts also retain:
Ongoing revenue from hosting games. I have read this can be £1m per year but, clearly, it depends.
Another scenario:
It has been reported that the franchises at Lord’s (51 per cent owned by the MCC) and The Oval (51 per cent owned by Surrey CCC) are valued at £150m. The other six were much smaller, £200m combined.
If those two sales of 51 per cent went through at this price, hosts would receive £60m and the other 18 parties (hosts, non-hosts and if applicable the MCC) would get £0.42m each.
Values go up and down. But I would argue the value of the 51 per cent would go up if, as expected, Indian players feature, interest increases in the subcontinent and media rights go up. We know it will get backed to the hilt by the ECB. Therefore the reward-risk ratio is very skewed.
But more generally, I’d argue that the MCC and Surrey are pricisely the two organisations who do NOT need this extra money. But they could be its biggest beneficiaries.
☕️ When I started this newsletter I made two promises, it will be free forever and your data will never be misused. If you like this newsletter (and you can afford it) please consider buying me a coffee via Ko-Fi or subscribe via Patreon. All coffee buyers are name-checked in the next edition.☕️
PS. I am on Threads. Join me there as Twitter has been ruined. Also here are my social media links - Facebook | Instagram
PPS I have set up a County Cricket Chat space on Reddit - r/CountyCricketChat
PPPS If you want to get involved in any groups to change this situation. Then there is the County Cricket Members Group and, of course, the Cricket Supporters Association.
County Championship - previews
Division One
Hampshire vs Worcestershire
Kent vs Nottinghamshire
Lancashire vs Somerset
Surrey vs Durham
Warwickshire vs Essex
Division Two
Derbyshire vs Middlesex
Glamorgan vs Yorkshire
Gloucestershire vs Sussex
Northamptonshire vs Leicestershire
Somerset pull off dramatic win over Surrey in thrilling finish | The Guardian
Vaughan, Leach lead spin surge as Somerset ignite title hopes | Cricinfo
County Championship speculation - round 12 | r/Cricket on Reddit
County Championship 2024: All the permutations ahead of the final two rounds | The Cricketer ($)
Keaton Jennings: 'Lancashire fundamentally not good enough' | BBC Sport
A surprisingly easy effort to catch up with the County Championship after several months with our eyes elsewhere | King Cricket
Vitality T20 Blast final - Gloucestershire's T20 Blast glory goes beyond the game | ESPNcricinfo
Player contracts, deals, news
Matt Lamb retires from professional cricket | Derbyshire County Cricket Club
Worcestershire sign spin bowler Tom Hinley for 2025 | BBC Sport
Durham: Batter Emilio Gay signs on loan for two games | BBC Sport
Emilio Gay joins Durham on loan for remainder of season | ESPNcricinfo
Roman Walker: Warwickshire sign Leicestershire seamer on two-game loan | BBC Sport
Rob Lord: Nottinghamshire re-sign seam bowler on two-year deal | BBC Sport
Luke Fletcher, Nottinghamshire's stalwart seamer, to leave club at end of season | ESPNcricinfo
Farewell, Fletch: a look back on Luke Fletcher's Green and Gold career | Nottingham CCC
Essex announces Testimonial Year for Nick Browne in 2025 | Essex CCC
Cameron Bancroft returns to Australia after winning Vitality Blast | Gloucestershire Cricket
Scott Borthwick ruled out for remainder of the 2024 season | Durham Cricket
Northants opener Prithvi Shaw to miss final two County Championship matches | Northamptonshire CCC
Rahane To Miss Final Two Matches of Season | Leicestershire CCC
News, Views and Interviews
George Dobell writes:
“The people I thought were going to champion county cricket are, quite possibly inadvertently, hastening its decline.
“The people I thought were going to protect Test cricket are, quite possibly inadvertently, hastening its decline.
“The people I thought were going to prioritise international cricket are instead prioritising the sale of The Hundred.
“The people I thought were going to be different are increasingly similar to the people they replaced
“OK, that last bit is probably a bit harsh.
“….. A few years ago, when Surrey regularly sold out its Blast games and trumpeted the diversity of their audience, Thompson and Gould were The Hundred’s biggest critics. They were the ones who said it would cannibalise the rest of the game. They were the ones who said it was vastly expensive, would marginalise half the counties and was unnecessary if only the Blast received a fraction of the same investment.
“Yet, here we are. Thompson and Gould are leading the sale of equity in Hundred teams and continuing to prioritise the competition to the detriment of so much around it.”
Subscribe to The Cricketer online for the full piece. I think they are the only publication consistently asking real questions about what is going on.
Sky Sports to veto Surrey rebrand of Oval Invincibles | City AM
This is a revealing nugget.
Surrey, perhaps the only county rich enough to retain their 51 per cent stake, cannot change the name of Oval Invincibles to that of the county.
At the start, franchises and counties were always supposed to be separate. Like so much of this competition, this has been a ‘bait and switch’. The franchises were set up for the good of the whole game but over half has been gifted to hosts. They will keep 80 per cent of any sale, on top of their host fees, see above.
But they cannot go the whole hog and fit the franchise into the mother brand.
It is just a disjointed mess. There was never a plan, just a series of switches to create something the counties and their members did not control. It brings in external investment free of them. The ECB had authority over the calendar but they needed to get access to the stadiums to make it work.
Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney: Wrexham owners 'make contact' over Welsh Fire stake | BBC Sport
Glamorgan hopes for windfall from partial sale of The H*ndred | Wales Online
A couple of stories from Glamorgan about you-know-what.
Expect more famous names linked from now on. The sell side wants buzz and the faceless, joyless private equity funds likely to vie with IPL teams will not create that.
Ed Balls’s mission to get cricket back into state schools | Times ($)
This should be the ECB’s top priority. So many other problems fall into place if this is achieved.
Instead of creating a deep, long-term love for the game, the governing body are busy selling control of it to those who will never feel the same way.
96 not out for Leonard - Rugby cricket fan gets a lovely surprise at Warwickshire County Cricket Club | Warwickshire World
A northern Italian town bans cricket | The Economist
Utilita Bowl cricket ground goes green in solar power switch - BBC News
Gloucestershire: No ECB sanctions for county after Northants abandonment - BBC Sport
Essex hit out at 'stupid' ECB after club is docked points for illegal bat | ESPNcricinfo
Club Statement | Essex CCC
Essex docked 12 points over use of oversized bat in County Championship - BBC Sport
Many Essex fans are irate about this. Some dipping into the usual conspiracy theories about the timing and the process.
Ultimately, the bat did fail the gauge test. Eventually. Therefore the deduction was going to come. Ten points for Nic Maddinson’s bat in 2022 was too high, so quite why it was 12 for the same offence this time I do not know. It was hardly a spurious appeal. But that is just the start of the questions.
Why is the club punished when it is a player’s responsibility? Why are different-sized gauges being used? Why the hell does it take so long? And why has no bat been tested since Khushi’s at the start of the season?
This should be an open-and-shut case but cricket makes life hard for itself. Especially on disciplinary issues.
Here's my solution.
For a start, every umpire and match referee has the same gauge. (Incredibly, it seems this is where we have to start)
If a bat fails on the pitch with the umpires, it is tested by the match referee straight after the game. If it fails both, the player gets an automatic three red-ball match ban (white-ball length etc) starting for the next fixture. If it does not, there is no offence.
If club appeals without any extra evidence not provided immediately and the ruling goes against them they risk an increase in the punishment.
Nagoya baseball stadium to be used for cricket in 2026 Asian Games | Dawn.com
Kia Oval to host first ever Vitality Blast Women's Finals Day | Kia Oval
2025 Domestic Finals dates and venues confirmed | ECB
Has the ECB’s lust for success damned the future of Durham cricket? | Palatinate
LancsTV survey | Lancs TV
This looks like a survey designed to gather data about charging for county streams.
Honestly, it is nuts. For a start, they are going to get ripped off and put back on YouTube for free but it will be a poorer experience from which the club get no benefit. The Premier League and top-level boxing struggle to stamp out piracy so how is county cricket going to do it?
Then, think about Somerset v Surrey last week. There were almost 20,000 watching a finish that will be remembered for years. It got this country’s cricket scene buzzing. That is not directly monetisable like, say 2,000 paying customers, but it is so important.
County cricket is too weak to put up barriers to access and, after a decade or so of great service, the audience expects its streams free and frictionless now. There are other ways to get value for the service and counties should work together to keep costs down.
Are we really going to hide the game still further? Soon it will be so small there will be nothing to see.
Finally…
The story of this newsletter
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