Does the hundred make money or is it a loss leader for the ECB ?
Is the sponsorship and tv package bigger for the Blast or the Hundred ?
Make, hence the ability to hand £1.3m to the counties each year
Sky pay about £4m a year for the county game including the blast, and vitality less then a million as sponsors for the Blast. Sky and BBC pay about £40m a year for the Hundred, and KP, Cazoo and Vitality spend a few million between them as sponsors.
Can I watch Kent make a hash out of replying the Essex’s 331? Nope!
I’ve got the choice of one bollocks made up team playing another bollocks made up team or another bollocks made up team playing another bollocks made up team……(using the original Anglo Saxon meaning of the word).
Yes you can - it’s free to air on the kent cricket website . Or you could have bought a ticket to Chelmsford.
No I couldn’t have brought a ticket as I work and can’t make midweek games . I can’t see that on the website either so if you have a link that would be great
My point is that this is another way this competition undermines the one day game - if they must run it please not slap bang over the one day cup
Can I watch Kent make a hash out of replying the Essex’s 331? Nope!
I’ve got the choice of one bollocks made up team playing another bollocks made up team or another bollocks made up team playing another bollocks made up team……(using the original Anglo Saxon meaning of the word).
Yes you can - it’s free to air on the kent cricket website . Or you could have bought a ticket to Chelmsford.
No I couldn’t have brought a ticket as I work and can’t make midweek games . I can’t see that on the website either so if you have a link that would be great
My point is that this is another way this competition undermines the one day game - if they must run it please not slap bang over the one day cup
PS I was being a little tongue in cheeks with the first post….
Does the hundred make money or is it a loss leader for the ECB ?
Is the sponsorship and tv package bigger for the Blast or the Hundred ?
Found it ! Is on Essex ccc via YouTube - Thanks Billysboots!
Sorry missed your question Its usually on the Kent Cricket Website - Go to match center tab on the top of the page and its on that page. I think its a link to their you tube page as well.
Does the hundred make money or is it a loss leader for the ECB ?
Is the sponsorship and tv package bigger for the Blast or the Hundred ?
Make, hence the ability to hand £1.3m to the counties each year
Sky pay about £4m a year for the county game including the blast, and vitality less then a million as sponsors for the Blast. Sky and BBC pay about £40m a year for the Hundred, and KP, Cazoo and Vitality spend a few million between them as sponsors.
Thats a huge difference !! I wonder why there hasn't been that level of revenue in the Blast or has it diminished in real terms over the years ?
Does the hundred make money or is it a loss leader for the ECB ?
Is the sponsorship and tv package bigger for the Blast or the Hundred ?
Make, hence the ability to hand £1.3m to the counties each year
Sky pay about £4m a year for the county game including the blast, and vitality less then a million as sponsors for the Blast. Sky and BBC pay about £40m a year for the Hundred, and KP, Cazoo and Vitality spend a few million between them as sponsors.
The Hundred, in isolation, isn't profitable.
The revenue for the Hundred's first season was indeed expected to total £51.1m: a combination of UK broadcasting (£36.5m) and international broadcasting (£4m) revenue, sponsorship (£4m), tickets (£6.5m) and some from merchandising. And the "exact budget" is, according to an ECB spokesperson, £38.9m.
But there is an exclusion here that is quite important: payments of £1.3m to each of the first-class counties and the MCC, which contributes another £24.7m to the costs and takes the overall figure (at this stage, anyway) to £63.6m. If you look at it that way, the Hundred would lose more than £12m in its first year.
"The ECB has always attributed the cost of the £1.3m per county in the P&L, because that was what convinced many to support it," the source told ESPNcricinfo. "Since then the costs have rocketed. Tom Harrison's numbers also don't include set-up costs over the last four years of circa £15m, which have been quietly forgotten. The fact is, this competition will now never be profitable."
As to the TV rights this is the basis of the newly agreed deal:
Sky Sports has agreed a four-year extension to its current deal as the main broadcast partner of the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB).
The ECB said the agreement, which runs from 2025 to 2028 and covers men’s and women’s internationals, The Hundred and the Vitality Blast, would see Sky show more cricket than ever before.
Both parties said the deal represented an increase in investment from Sky, which is reported to currently pay £220m a year.
It has not been confirmed whether the BBC will continue this arrangement beyond 2024.
As part of the new deal Sky Sports has committed to showing 90 hours of additional cricket a week, including more action from the women’s game and T20 competition the Vitality Blast.
So £220m per annum from Sky alone for all cricket. But that £1.3m payment to the Counties isn't guaranteed for the duration of the Hundred:
Under the previous deal, the first-class counties (and the MCC) were guaranteed £1.3m a year each in return for allowing The Hundred to take place without their involvement. The new deal has been announced before any such agreement has been reached.
At the same time, there is increasing concern about a hole of anything up to £50m within the game's finances as a result of inflationary pressures. As a result, the ECB has announced a review into the finances of the game, leading some to fear there will be an attempt to cut those £1.3m annual payments. But with Vitality Blast and Royal London Cup attendances hit, in part, by scheduling issues created by the prioritisation of The Hundred, the counties are likely to fight hard for an increase on those payments.
What is equally true is that the ECB had in 2016 reserves of £73m but due to the effect of Covid and the money pumped into the Hundred that dwindled to a worrying £2m last year. A net profit of £21m this year means that they now have £23m in reserves.
However, The Hundred was very profitable for Harrison and his fellow Directors as it, notionally, allowed them to justify their £2m bonus. Though the 60 plus people made redundant by the ECB might argue otherwise as would those that suffered from racism at Yorkshire without an investigation from the ECB as would the Pakistan Cricket Board too for the cancellation by Harrison of the England tour.
But there is an exclusion here that is quite important: payments of £1.3m to each of the first-class counties and the MCC, which contributes another £24.7m to the costs and takes the overall figure (at this stage, anyway) to £63.6m. If you look at it that way, the Hundred would lose more than £12m in its first year.
what an extraordinary reach; it’s like saying the Premier League isn’t profitable because they pay the TV money out to the clubs
But there is an exclusion here that is quite important: payments of £1.3m to each of the first-class counties and the MCC, which contributes another £24.7m to the costs and takes the overall figure (at this stage, anyway) to £63.6m. If you look at it that way, the Hundred would lose more than £12m in its first year.
what an extraordinary reach; it’s like saying the Premier League isn’t profitable because they pay the TV money out to the clubs
Well the PL wouldn't be profitable if it paid out more, including the money to the clubs, than it received. The balance sheet would show a loss wouldn't it? And as stated that's without the £15m set up costs being taken into account which have been conveniently buried. The £1.3m per county is a known cost to the Hundred. Which is why the ECB want to reduce it or, even better, get rid of it.
Does the hundred make money or is it a loss leader for the ECB ?
Is the sponsorship and tv package bigger for the Blast or the Hundred ?
Found it ! Is on Essex ccc via YouTube - Thanks Billysboots!
Sorry missed your question Its usually on the Kent Cricket Website - Go to match center tab on the top of the page and its on that page. I think its a link to their you tube page as well.
Thanks that’s really helpful. I had similar problems finding the page for parking at the Beckenham game. On the surface it’s a straightforward website but some elements aren’t quite as easy to locate.
Wish I hadn’t found the stream after Kent’s batting performance!
I can't imagine many of the new cricket fans being brought in by The Hundred, many of whom getting their first-ever chance to see cricket stars from all over the world will be worried about the minutiae of the ECB's Profit and Loss account. I think they'll be more excited to see superstars up close, hitting sixes and smashing the stumps.
But, at the same time, it's great that each of the counties benefit to the tune of £1.3m a year. There can't be many sports where clubs derive such a substantial portion of their revenue from a competition they don't take part in.
I can't imagine many of the new cricket fans being brought in by The Hundred, many of whom getting their first-ever chance to see cricket stars from all over the world will be worried about the minutiae of the ECB's Profit and Loss account. I think they'll be more excited to see superstars up close, hitting sixes and smashing the stumps.
But, at the same time, it's great that each of the counties benefit to the tune of £1.3m a year. There can't be many sports where clubs derive such a substantial portion of their revenue from a competition they don't take part in.
Er, where do you think the majority of players come from, if not those counties? You might want to read Atherton’s article today on the development of said players. in the meantime as already pointed out counties try and compete without several of their players. county cricket fans being short changed but you’ll know that.
Imagine going to watch Charlton in a major comp without their best players because they’re away participating in a franchise event? Fans wouldn’t stand for it but sadly too many county boards allowed it to happen.
And I'm not surprised by your response. I've asked you to inform this lady where her and other kids can watch cricket during the six weeks of the hols which they have been used to doing for years but you have no answer. So revert to your usual tactic of "playing the man" and yet again exposing your minimal knowledge of what actually goes on at grass root level and how youngsters actually become cricketers. There is no pathway whatsoever for them to become a cricketer via a franchise any more than there are places in the south west where kids can regularly watch a game when they are off school and the sun is shining. But that's growing the game apparently.
I do wonder if you might have a greater understanding if this was happening in football. Where only reserve football was available for a month of the season so players can go and play for London United. But play a type of football where first one to three wins. Because it's different. Rather than the Football League spending that money on promoting club football and making that product better.
Looking forward to seeing your response to this lady. Cut out the bullshit though because she's the type to see straight through it
I am sorry that the Editor of a cricket website whose sole aim is to promote county cricket is unhappy there is such a paucity of first class cricket being played in her favourite county this month. Fortunately, there is plenty of county cricket played in her county throughout the Summer. But, like all fans of Somerset, she will find her team doesn't play any cricket, of any format at all, anywhere until ... *checks notes* ... tomorrow morning. And, after that, she'll have to wait another 48 hours until they play again, at home.
Like supporters of eighteen "first class counties", the cricket she can see is limited. Unlike residents of 30 other counties in England and Wales, she at least gets to see her county play - residents in Norfolk or Buckinghamshire or Dorset or Devon (where, ironically, she bases her publication), and so on.
Should Somerset play fewer First Class games, so that more counties can have First Class status? Should there be a more equitable approach? Should Somerset invite other teams - perhaps overseas teams? - to play First Class matches in the county during August? As far as I am aware, there are no rules in place to stop the county serving up matches like this to what she believes to be a tsunami of demand for seats. Can counties persuade Universities to extend their seasons beyond mid-July in order to serve up First Class cricket at Taunton and other grounds?
These are all pertinent questions I hope she and her team of four, white, middle-aged men can pontificate when determining what's best for cricket in multi-cultural Britain. The Hundred doesn't - as far as I am aware - prevent counties playing First Class friendlies during August. (Happy to stand corrected if this is not what they voted for).
Taken in the round, bringing in viewing figures of 16.1m in its first season, half of whom are new to cricket probably, on balance (and this is only my contention, I am sure Ms Chave sees it differently) is worth it, even if it has resulted in First Class championship matches being played other than in August.
I don't put myself forward as having an answer to her question as to where her kids can see cricket during the holidays (other than the very obvious Somerset CCC fixture list, the plethora of televised cricket matches, treating them to a trip to Kent to see the Lions play SA, or to London to see some Test cricket). In contrast, she does put herself forward as someone who wants to "be a voice for those concerned at how top-class cricket is changing in this country". As such, surely it's down to her - and people like her - to put forward suggestions as to how she would like to see counties develop. Complaining that she and her kids can't see First Class cricket in Somerset isn't doing this. Physician, heal thyself.
In 2020 Somerset CCC made a surplus of £111,064. This is good news. The county is able to continue to pay players, open its gates, develop new talent and entertain its supporters throughout the year. The fact there was a surplus is partly due to (I assume) people like Ms Chave paying their subscriptions to the tune of almost half a million pounds for the year.
There was also a payment of £1m from the ECB, relating to the 2019 World Cup and another payment of £1.3m from the ECB in relation to The Hundred. the total ECB funding to Somerset CCC for the year was £5,212,860. If Ms Chave really wants county cricket to continue in a vacuum without "interference" from outside, she ought to be careful what she wishes for. Without ECB funding there would be no Somerset CCC.
LOL "The Hundred doesn't - as far as I am aware - prevent counties playing First Class friendlies during August."
First Class friendlies using 2nd XI teams you mean?
"But, like all fans of Somerset, she will find her team doesn't play any cricket, of any format at all, anywhere until ... *checks notes* ... tomorrow morning. And, after that, she'll have to wait another 48 hours until they play again, at home."
And yet again trying to be too clever for your own good - you really should have been a politician because your ability to stretch the truth has no limits. Tomorrow's game as you well know is at Leicester - a minimum seven hour round trip. Somerset have one home day of cricket after Sunday for the next 21 days. One day of accessible cricket. Brilliant.
And I think she's an even better scourer of fixture lists than even you or me. So she can travel from the county she lives in to see Somerset play away tomorrow; or travel from the county she lives in to see Somerset play at home on Sunday. If she really wanted to know where to see her county play, that's where she could start. And if Somerset have failed to put on first class cricket for her to watch in person, she could trade up and watch England later in the month.
First class cricket is first class cricket. If she wanted to use her influence to ensure her county played first class cricket, she should be heartily encouraged to do so. And if her rejection is that it would be 2nd XI teams (I haven't bothered to check whether she's ever put forward that objection), she'd need to have a solid position on whether Somerset players could be allowed to choose to represent other teams (England, franchises) or insist that Somerset players could only ever play for Somerset (and face the prospect of a very low and diminishing standard of cricket). It's great to have choices.
You really do sneer at county cricket and their supporters don't you and refuse to recognise the assertion that there is no pathway whatsoever to the Hundred without all the work that is undertaken by people that have nothing to do with the Hundred. If you as you say the standard of county cricket is diminishing (which is I think we can both agree the ECB would be directly responsible for) and those counties fail to survive then there will be no pathway.
Here is Michael Atherton's take on the situation - he knows a bit more about cricket than you or me. Ironically, this article is about a cricketer produced by Somerset, the very county that the lady and her kids mentioned above support and who is critical of the fact that one day of home cricket in the space of three weeks is available when kids are on hols:
Not long after the conclusion of the inaugural staging of the Hundred, the comms department of the ECB arranged a press conference via Zoom to reflect on its successful launch. The tournament’s managing director was on hand with the figures and when asked about the competition’s other benefits he talked of women’s cricket, naturally, which had been the biggest success, as well as the opportunity afforded for young men’s cricketers. Like “Will . . .”. Eventually, after an awkward pause, Smeed’s surname came to him.
Smeed, the 20-year-old Somerset batsman, was the breakout men’s star of last year’s competition, despite not having been picked up in the initial draft, and he made its first century on Wednesday evening for the Birmingham Phoenix side he represents. He has already been picked for the England Lions this summer, despite having yet to make his first-class debut or indeed without having played a List A game for his county.
Muscle-packed and dynamic, he is a six-hitter who has enjoyed some eye-catching success in the short-form cricket he has played — the T20 Blast, Pakistan Super League and now the Hundred.
Occasionally, you hear notes that jar: that Smeed, somehow, has been “produced” by the new competition, or that he was an unknown beforehand and has suddenly emerged from thin air, fully formed. Yet, there is an important distinction to be drawn: the Hundred, like the PSL and the Blast, has given him a platform, but he is a product of the game’s traditional systems, through county age-group matches, a county academy and ECB-funded pathways.
One of the advantages of having a son who plays (my lad, Josh, is at Middlesex) is that you get to see a whole cohort of young players at first hand, and it has been a source of joy to watch many of the boys that he grew up playing against going on to make their way in the professional game. I first saw Smeed, for example, at the Bunbury Festival — the tournament for the best under-15 regional players — in the summer of 2017.
I looked up that match yesterday — South West Under-15 v London and East Under-15 — in July of that year. From it, I counted at least a dozen players who have gone on to represent their counties in the professional game. Among that number, for example, was Tom Prest, who has captained England’s Young Lions and who made 181 for Hampshire in the Royal London Cup last week. He looks a player of real promise.
Smeed was already on English cricket’s radar by then, having being nurtured by Somerset, who have an enviable reputation for making the most of the talent around their county and beyond their immediate boundaries. Two years before the Bunbury Festival, for example, he was playing for Somerset Under-14 against Cornwall at Hayle, a match that included Lewis Goldsworthy, Sam Young and Kasey Aldridge, all of whom went on to represent Somerset’s first team.
After the Bunbury Festival, I kept tabs on Smeed’s progress. Later that year, he was playing in the ECB’s flagship under-17 regional competition at Loughborough, known as the Super 4s, the point from which those in charge of the ECB’s senior development programme really start to take notice. Smeed was playing well in advance of his age group by then, a measure of his promise, and he played in the Super 4s for three consecutive years. His runscoring didn’t stand out, but you could see the destructive potential there.
The point of all this is not to lay out some kind of potted career history or dismiss the platform that the Hundred has given Smeed, rather to remind those who may have tuned in on Wednesday evening that there has been an awful lot of help and investment along the way to get a young player to that point. Parents, teachers, friends, coaches, groundsmen and volunteers, giving time and energy and using precious resources, to develop young players and give them a chance to become the best they can be and achieve their dreams.
All over the country, these systems are in place: from formal county age groups and academies to the less formal networks that I outlined in a piece with Leicestershire’s head of development, Jigar Naik, earlier in the season. Funded and mature — and no doubt in need of improvement in areas such as cost and accessibility — these systems have produced good young players for English cricket for decades.
As the debates intensify around franchise cricket and private investment in the game, and how it all knits together with more traditional structures, it would be wise to remember that one cannot exist without the other. All over the cricketing world, franchises are reaping the benefits of the investment of others. In this instance, Birmingham Phoenix are enjoying the fruits of Somerset’s labour.
And without Somerset's labour there would be no Hundred.
I can't imagine many of the new cricket fans being brought in by The Hundred, many of whom getting their first-ever chance to see cricket stars from all over the world will be worried about the minutiae of the ECB's Profit and Loss account. I think they'll be more excited to see superstars up close, hitting sixes and smashing the stumps.
But, at the same time, it's great that each of the counties benefit to the tune of £1.3m a year. There can't be many sports where clubs derive such a substantial portion of their revenue from a competition they don't take part in.
Er, where do you think the majority of players come from, if not those counties? You might want to read Atherton’s article today on the development of said players. in the meantime as already pointed out counties try and compete without several of their players. county cricket fans being short changed but you’ll know that.
Imagine going to watch Charlton in a major comp without their best players because they’re away participating in a franchise event? Fans wouldn’t stand for it but sadly too many county boards allowed it to happen.
There's a very tenuous equivalence in football which is where I might go and watch Charlton play without players who are representing their countries. (As I say this is very tenuous, as it's rare, but it often results in the fixture being postponed). In those cases, I don't think Charlton would get significant remuneration from the Footballl Associations.
As I say, it's rare in the sporting world for teams to benefit financially from a competition in which they don't, as it were, compete.
Is it the format of the game or the fact its franchised that's causing the friction. If it was a county comp and played exclusively during August would that be ok ? So the ECB took away the 1.3 million for each county and just ran it as a normal competition ?
And I'm not surprised by your response. I've asked you to inform this lady where her and other kids can watch cricket during the six weeks of the hols which they have been used to doing for years but you have no answer. So revert to your usual tactic of "playing the man" and yet again exposing your minimal knowledge of what actually goes on at grass root level and how youngsters actually become cricketers. There is no pathway whatsoever for them to become a cricketer via a franchise any more than there are places in the south west where kids can regularly watch a game when they are off school and the sun is shining. But that's growing the game apparently.
I do wonder if you might have a greater understanding if this was happening in football. Where only reserve football was available for a month of the season so players can go and play for London United. But play a type of football where first one to three wins. Because it's different. Rather than the Football League spending that money on promoting club football and making that product better.
Looking forward to seeing your response to this lady. Cut out the bullshit though because she's the type to see straight through it
I am sorry that the Editor of a cricket website whose sole aim is to promote county cricket is unhappy there is such a paucity of first class cricket being played in her favourite county this month. Fortunately, there is plenty of county cricket played in her county throughout the Summer. But, like all fans of Somerset, she will find her team doesn't play any cricket, of any format at all, anywhere until ... *checks notes* ... tomorrow morning. And, after that, she'll have to wait another 48 hours until they play again, at home.
Like supporters of eighteen "first class counties", the cricket she can see is limited. Unlike residents of 30 other counties in England and Wales, she at least gets to see her county play - residents in Norfolk or Buckinghamshire or Dorset or Devon (where, ironically, she bases her publication), and so on.
Should Somerset play fewer First Class games, so that more counties can have First Class status? Should there be a more equitable approach? Should Somerset invite other teams - perhaps overseas teams? - to play First Class matches in the county during August? As far as I am aware, there are no rules in place to stop the county serving up matches like this to what she believes to be a tsunami of demand for seats. Can counties persuade Universities to extend their seasons beyond mid-July in order to serve up First Class cricket at Taunton and other grounds?
These are all pertinent questions I hope she and her team of four, white, middle-aged men can pontificate when determining what's best for cricket in multi-cultural Britain. The Hundred doesn't - as far as I am aware - prevent counties playing First Class friendlies during August. (Happy to stand corrected if this is not what they voted for).
Taken in the round, bringing in viewing figures of 16.1m in its first season, half of whom are new to cricket probably, on balance (and this is only my contention, I am sure Ms Chave sees it differently) is worth it, even if it has resulted in First Class championship matches being played other than in August.
I don't put myself forward as having an answer to her question as to where her kids can see cricket during the holidays (other than the very obvious Somerset CCC fixture list, the plethora of televised cricket matches, treating them to a trip to Kent to see the Lions play SA, or to London to see some Test cricket). In contrast, she does put herself forward as someone who wants to "be a voice for those concerned at how top-class cricket is changing in this country". As such, surely it's down to her - and people like her - to put forward suggestions as to how she would like to see counties develop. Complaining that she and her kids can't see First Class cricket in Somerset isn't doing this. Physician, heal thyself.
In 2020 Somerset CCC made a surplus of £111,064. This is good news. The county is able to continue to pay players, open its gates, develop new talent and entertain its supporters throughout the year. The fact there was a surplus is partly due to (I assume) people like Ms Chave paying their subscriptions to the tune of almost half a million pounds for the year.
There was also a payment of £1m from the ECB, relating to the 2019 World Cup and another payment of £1.3m from the ECB in relation to The Hundred. the total ECB funding to Somerset CCC for the year was £5,212,860. If Ms Chave really wants county cricket to continue in a vacuum without "interference" from outside, she ought to be careful what she wishes for. Without ECB funding there would be no Somerset CCC.
LOL "The Hundred doesn't - as far as I am aware - prevent counties playing First Class friendlies during August."
First Class friendlies using 2nd XI teams you mean?
"But, like all fans of Somerset, she will find her team doesn't play any cricket, of any format at all, anywhere until ... *checks notes* ... tomorrow morning. And, after that, she'll have to wait another 48 hours until they play again, at home."
And yet again trying to be too clever for your own good - you really should have been a politician because your ability to stretch the truth has no limits. Tomorrow's game as you well know is at Leicester - a minimum seven hour round trip. Somerset have one home day of cricket after Sunday for the next 21 days. One day of accessible cricket. Brilliant.
And I think she's an even better scourer of fixture lists than even you or me. So she can travel from the county she lives in to see Somerset play away tomorrow; or travel from the county she lives in to see Somerset play at home on Sunday. If she really wanted to know where to see her county play, that's where she could start. And if Somerset have failed to put on first class cricket for her to watch in person, she could trade up and watch England later in the month.
First class cricket is first class cricket. If she wanted to use her influence to ensure her county played first class cricket, she should be heartily encouraged to do so. And if her rejection is that it would be 2nd XI teams (I haven't bothered to check whether she's ever put forward that objection), she'd need to have a solid position on whether Somerset players could be allowed to choose to represent other teams (England, franchises) or insist that Somerset players could only ever play for Somerset (and face the prospect of a very low and diminishing standard of cricket). It's great to have choices.
You really do sneer at county cricket and their supporters don't you and refuse to recognise the assertion that there is no pathway whatsoever to the Hundred without all the work that is undertaken by people that have nothing to do with the Hundred. If you as you say the standard of county cricket is diminishing (which is I think we can both agree the ECB would be directly responsible for) and those counties fail to survive then there will be no pathway.
I don't sneer at county cricket supporters. They're a small band of passionate, mostly likeable, decent, harmless, proper, "English" folk. Jolly good luck to them. I think suggesting that I 'sneer' at them is a bit like playing the man rather than the ball.
As for whether I "refuse to recognise the assertion that there is no pathway whatsoever to the Hundred without all the work that is undertaken by people that have nothing to do with the Hundred", it's a bit convoluted. I have never "refused to recognise" that. That strange assertion has never been put to me, as far as I am aware. No-one turns up at The Hundred as a fully-fledged, experienced cricketer. They get there by the skills they posses and the coaching from which they benefit, whether that's at school, from clubs, universities, minor counties, first class counties, ECB schemes, Chance to Shine (one of those, obviously, is very well remunerated for the work they put in).
The teams in The Hundred benefit from the development of players, wherever that development comes from. As do counties.
Again, I don't think most of the kids that turn up at The Hundred games spend too much time worrying about whether Jos Buttler developed his reverse ramp at Somerset, or had it properly coached into him in Lancashire; or whether Sam Curran learned to swing the new ball at Surrey or at Wellington College; or who should have the most credit for Adam Zampa's legspin out of New South Wales, Sydney, South Australia, Adelaide, Melbourne, Pune, Guyana or Essex.
It's probably right that the county-level development of players in The Hundred is compensated. And, for now, that compensation is set arbitrarily at £1.3m a year. I don't know how that compares with the payments counties should make for the development of their players to schools, clubs, universities, and schemes like Chance to Shine, but I imagine it compares well.
Is it the format of the game or the fact its franchised that's causing the friction. If it was a county comp and played exclusively during August would that be ok ? So the ECB took away the 1.3 million for each county and just ran it as a normal competition ?
I think - for what it's worth - that if that happened, the counties would make substantially less money.
Is it the format of the game or the fact its franchised that's causing the friction. If it was a county comp and played exclusively during August would that be ok ? So the ECB took away the 1.3 million for each county and just ran it as a normal competition ?
For me it is this:
The ECB and paid commentators pretending that this is a whole new game when it actually isn't - there wasn't a single player in one of yesterday's game that didn't appear in the Blast this season. How is that different? There are very few current internationals playing because so many other countries are committed to playing matches so it has totally failed to live up to that billing. England players like Stokes and Bairstow have dropped out of playing because it isn't of sufficient importance. It will never rival the IPL for that reason. It also does not have to be run exclusively in August. The Blast isn't.
The Hundred also serves to undermine county cricket to the extent that we could see the likes of Somerset, Leics, Kent, Northants become minor counties. The ECB have to provide funding to counties come what may if they want to grow the game because otherwise there would not be any pathway to England let alone the Hundred and the ECB want to grow the game - so whether it's £1.3m or £500k there would still have to be some sort of payment made. Terrestrial coverage has been a massive bonus in bringing the game to more people but the Blast re-vamped and sold in the way that the Hundred was really would have done the job and helped the counties too grow their audience and support. Interestingly, there is no confirmation as yet from the BBC that they will support the Hundred beyond 2024 and the ECB have fudged questions as to whether they are likely to continue to do so.
Instead, we now have a situation where four competitions of top quality cricket cannot be sustained. So the 50 over game, for which there is a World Cup next year, is made up of county 2nd XI players and club and academy substitutes and where a supporter if they want to see their team play more than once in three weeks in August has to travel hundreds of miles to watch them play away. There is also talk of reducing the 4-day game to just 10 fixtures - how will that prepare the Test players of tomorrow?
Proper cricketing people like Atherton, Butcher, Pringle etc etc are recognising the damage that the Hundred is doing to the game. And as I say more people here would do so also if such a thing happened in football where you could only watch the stiffs at your club for a month right at the height of the season. There would be absolute outrage from Charlton supporters. And rightly so.
Is it the format of the game or the fact its franchised that's causing the friction. If it was a county comp and played exclusively during August would that be ok ? So the ECB took away the 1.3 million for each county and just ran it as a normal competition ?
For me it’s the franchise thing. I’ve tried to watch two games in the last week and given up on both because it just seems so meaningless. Players dressed as packs of crisps who were drafted into franchise teams are difficult to take seriously.
Is it the format of the game or the fact its franchised that's causing the friction. If it was a county comp and played exclusively during August would that be ok ? So the ECB took away the 1.3 million for each county and just ran it as a normal competition ?
For me it is this:
The ECB and paid commentators pretending that this is a whole new game when it actually isn't - there wasn't a single player in one of yesterday's game that didn't appear in the Blast this season. How is that different? There are very few current internationals playing because so many other countries are committed to playing matches so it has totally failed to live up to that billing. England players like Stokes and Bairstow have dropped out of playing because it isn't of sufficient importance. It will never rival the IPL for that reason. It also does not have to be run exclusively in August. The Blast isn't.
The Hundred also serves to undermine county cricket to the extent that we could see the likes of Somerset, Leics, Kent, Northants become minor counties. The ECB have to provide funding to counties come what may if they want to grow the game because otherwise there would not be any pathway to England let alone the Hundred and the ECB want to grow the game - so whether it's £1.3m or £500k there would still have to be some sort of payment made. Terrestrial coverage has been a massive bonus in bringing the game to more people but the Blast re-vamped and sold in the way that the Hundred was really would have done the job and helped the counties too grow their audience and support. Interestingly, there is no confirmation as yet from the BBC that they will support the Hundred beyond 2024 and the ECB have fudged questions as to whether they are likely to continue to do so.
Instead, we now have a situation where four competitions of top quality cricket cannot be sustained. So the 50 over game, for which there is a World Cup next year, is made up of county 2nd XI players and club and academy substitutes and where a supporter if they want to see their team play more than once in three weeks in August has to travel hundreds of miles to watch them play away. There is also talk of reducing the 4-day game to just 10 fixtures - how will that prepare the Test players of tomorrow?
Proper cricketing people like Atherton, Butcher, Pringle etc etc are recognising the damage that the Hundred is doing to the game. And as I say more people here would do so also if such a thing happened in football where you could only watch the stiffs at your club for a month right at the height of the season. There would be absolute outrage from Charlton supporters. And rightly so.
Ok understood , so from what you are saying its the franchise bit that grates for you. If this was a county comp it would be ok ?
The only game I have seen that wasn't one sided felt one sided until Oval Invincibles got a lot of last ditch boundaries. That will be a disapointment so far.
Is it the format of the game or the fact its franchised that's causing the friction. If it was a county comp and played exclusively during August would that be ok ? So the ECB took away the 1.3 million for each county and just ran it as a normal competition ?
For me it is this:
The ECB and paid commentators pretending that this is a whole new game when it actually isn't - there wasn't a single player in one of yesterday's game that didn't appear in the Blast this season. How is that different? There are very few current internationals playing because so many other countries are committed to playing matches so it has totally failed to live up to that billing. England players like Stokes and Bairstow have dropped out of playing because it isn't of sufficient importance. It will never rival the IPL for that reason. It also does not have to be run exclusively in August. The Blast isn't.
The Hundred also serves to undermine county cricket to the extent that we could see the likes of Somerset, Leics, Kent, Northants become minor counties. The ECB have to provide funding to counties come what may if they want to grow the game because otherwise there would not be any pathway to England let alone the Hundred and the ECB want to grow the game - so whether it's £1.3m or £500k there would still have to be some sort of payment made. Terrestrial coverage has been a massive bonus in bringing the game to more people but the Blast re-vamped and sold in the way that the Hundred was really would have done the job and helped the counties too grow their audience and support. Interestingly, there is no confirmation as yet from the BBC that they will support the Hundred beyond 2024 and the ECB have fudged questions as to whether they are likely to continue to do so.
Instead, we now have a situation where four competitions of top quality cricket cannot be sustained. So the 50 over game, for which there is a World Cup next year, is made up of county 2nd XI players and club and academy substitutes and where a supporter if they want to see their team play more than once in three weeks in August has to travel hundreds of miles to watch them play away. There is also talk of reducing the 4-day game to just 10 fixtures - how will that prepare the Test players of tomorrow?
Proper cricketing people like Atherton, Butcher, Pringle etc etc are recognising the damage that the Hundred is doing to the game. And as I say more people here would do so also if such a thing happened in football where you could only watch the stiffs at your club for a month right at the height of the season. There would be absolute outrage from Charlton supporters. And rightly so.
It has happened.
Charlton allowed Flanagan, Powell and Ambrose to leave early to appear for the New England Tea Men. I was livid ... actually we all were.
Is it the format of the game or the fact its franchised that's causing the friction. If it was a county comp and played exclusively during August would that be ok ? So the ECB took away the 1.3 million for each county and just ran it as a normal competition ?
For me it is this:
The ECB and paid commentators pretending that this is a whole new game when it actually isn't - there wasn't a single player in one of yesterday's game that didn't appear in the Blast this season. How is that different? There are very few current internationals playing because so many other countries are committed to playing matches so it has totally failed to live up to that billing. England players like Stokes and Bairstow have dropped out of playing because it isn't of sufficient importance. It will never rival the IPL for that reason. It also does not have to be run exclusively in August. The Blast isn't.
The Hundred also serves to undermine county cricket to the extent that we could see the likes of Somerset, Leics, Kent, Northants become minor counties. The ECB have to provide funding to counties come what may if they want to grow the game because otherwise there would not be any pathway to England let alone the Hundred and the ECB want to grow the game - so whether it's £1.3m or £500k there would still have to be some sort of payment made. Terrestrial coverage has been a massive bonus in bringing the game to more people but the Blast re-vamped and sold in the way that the Hundred was really would have done the job and helped the counties too grow their audience and support. Interestingly, there is no confirmation as yet from the BBC that they will support the Hundred beyond 2024 and the ECB have fudged questions as to whether they are likely to continue to do so.
Instead, we now have a situation where four competitions of top quality cricket cannot be sustained. So the 50 over game, for which there is a World Cup next year, is made up of county 2nd XI players and club and academy substitutes and where a supporter if they want to see their team play more than once in three weeks in August has to travel hundreds of miles to watch them play away. There is also talk of reducing the 4-day game to just 10 fixtures - how will that prepare the Test players of tomorrow?
Proper cricketing people like Atherton, Butcher, Pringle etc etc are recognising the damage that the Hundred is doing to the game. And as I say more people here would do so also if such a thing happened in football where you could only watch the stiffs at your club for a month right at the height of the season. There would be absolute outrage from Charlton supporters. And rightly so.
It has happened.
Charlton allowed Flanagan, Powell and Ambrose to leave early to appear for the New England Tea Men. I was livid ... actually we all were.
I forgot about them. Did Ambrose actually come back?
Comments
Does the hundred make money or is it a loss leader for the ECB ?
Sky pay about £4m a year for the county game including the blast, and vitality less then a million as sponsors for the Blast. Sky and BBC pay about £40m a year for the Hundred, and KP, Cazoo and Vitality spend a few million between them as sponsors.
"The ECB has always attributed the cost of the £1.3m per county in the P&L, because that was what convinced many to support it," the source told ESPNcricinfo. "Since then the costs have rocketed. Tom Harrison's numbers also don't include set-up costs over the last four years of circa £15m, which have been quietly forgotten. The fact is, this competition will now never be profitable."
As to the TV rights this is the basis of the newly agreed deal:
Sky Sports has agreed a four-year extension to its current deal as the main broadcast partner of the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB).
The ECB said the agreement, which runs from 2025 to 2028 and covers men’s and women’s internationals, The Hundred and the Vitality Blast, would see Sky show more cricket than ever before.
Both parties said the deal represented an increase in investment from Sky, which is reported to currently pay £220m a year.
It has not been confirmed whether the BBC will continue this arrangement beyond 2024.
As part of the new deal Sky Sports has committed to showing 90 hours of additional cricket a week, including more action from the women’s game and T20 competition the Vitality Blast.
So £220m per annum from Sky alone for all cricket. But that £1.3m payment to the Counties isn't guaranteed for the duration of the Hundred:
Under the previous deal, the first-class counties (and the MCC) were guaranteed £1.3m a year each in return for allowing The Hundred to take place without their involvement. The new deal has been announced before any such agreement has been reached.
At the same time, there is increasing concern about a hole of anything up to £50m within the game's finances as a result of inflationary pressures. As a result, the ECB has announced a review into the finances of the game, leading some to fear there will be an attempt to cut those £1.3m annual payments. But with Vitality Blast and Royal London Cup attendances hit, in part, by scheduling issues created by the prioritisation of The Hundred, the counties are likely to fight hard for an increase on those payments.
What is equally true is that the ECB had in 2016 reserves of £73m but due to the effect of Covid and the money pumped into the Hundred that dwindled to a worrying £2m last year. A net profit of £21m this year means that they now have £23m in reserves.
However, The Hundred was very profitable for Harrison and his fellow Directors as it, notionally, allowed them to justify their £2m bonus. Though the 60 plus people made redundant by the ECB might argue otherwise as would those that suffered from racism at Yorkshire without an investigation from the ECB as would the Pakistan Cricket Board too for the cancellation by Harrison of the England tour.
what an extraordinary reach; it’s like saying the Premier League isn’t profitable because they pay the TV money out to the clubs
Nite nite lovelies ♥️
Wish I hadn’t found the stream after Kent’s batting performance!
But, at the same time, it's great that each of the counties benefit to the tune of £1.3m a year. There can't be many sports where clubs derive such a substantial portion of their revenue from a competition they don't take part in.
in the meantime as already pointed out counties try and compete without several of their players.
county cricket fans being short changed but you’ll know that.
Here is Michael Atherton's take on the situation - he knows a bit more about cricket than you or me. Ironically, this article is about a cricketer produced by Somerset, the very county that the lady and her kids mentioned above support and who is critical of the fact that one day of home cricket in the space of three weeks is available when kids are on hols:
Not long after the conclusion of the inaugural staging of the Hundred, the comms department of the ECB arranged a press conference via Zoom to reflect on its successful launch. The tournament’s managing director was on hand with the figures and when asked about the competition’s other benefits he talked of women’s cricket, naturally, which had been the biggest success, as well as the opportunity afforded for young men’s cricketers. Like “Will . . .”. Eventually, after an awkward pause, Smeed’s surname came to him.
Smeed, the 20-year-old Somerset batsman, was the breakout men’s star of last year’s competition, despite not having been picked up in the initial draft, and he made its first century on Wednesday evening for the Birmingham Phoenix side he represents. He has already been picked for the England Lions this summer, despite having yet to make his first-class debut or indeed without having played a List A game for his county.
Muscle-packed and dynamic, he is a six-hitter who has enjoyed some eye-catching success in the short-form cricket he has played — the T20 Blast, Pakistan Super League and now the Hundred.
Occasionally, you hear notes that jar: that Smeed, somehow, has been “produced” by the new competition, or that he was an unknown beforehand and has suddenly emerged from thin air, fully formed. Yet, there is an important distinction to be drawn: the Hundred, like the PSL and the Blast, has given him a platform, but he is a product of the game’s traditional systems, through county age-group matches, a county academy and ECB-funded pathways.
One of the advantages of having a son who plays (my lad, Josh, is at Middlesex) is that you get to see a whole cohort of young players at first hand, and it has been a source of joy to watch many of the boys that he grew up playing against going on to make their way in the professional game. I first saw Smeed, for example, at the Bunbury Festival — the tournament for the best under-15 regional players — in the summer of 2017.
I looked up that match yesterday — South West Under-15 v London and East Under-15 — in July of that year. From it, I counted at least a dozen players who have gone on to represent their counties in the professional game. Among that number, for example, was Tom Prest, who has captained England’s Young Lions and who made 181 for Hampshire in the Royal London Cup last week. He looks a player of real promise.
Smeed was already on English cricket’s radar by then, having being nurtured by Somerset, who have an enviable reputation for making the most of the talent around their county and beyond their immediate boundaries. Two years before the Bunbury Festival, for example, he was playing for Somerset Under-14 against Cornwall at Hayle, a match that included Lewis Goldsworthy, Sam Young and Kasey Aldridge, all of whom went on to represent Somerset’s first team.
After the Bunbury Festival, I kept tabs on Smeed’s progress. Later that year, he was playing in the ECB’s flagship under-17 regional competition at Loughborough, known as the Super 4s, the point from which those in charge of the ECB’s senior development programme really start to take notice. Smeed was playing well in advance of his age group by then, a measure of his promise, and he played in the Super 4s for three consecutive years. His runscoring didn’t stand out, but you could see the destructive potential there.
The point of all this is not to lay out some kind of potted career history or dismiss the platform that the Hundred has given Smeed, rather to remind those who may have tuned in on Wednesday evening that there has been an awful lot of help and investment along the way to get a young player to that point. Parents, teachers, friends, coaches, groundsmen and volunteers, giving time and energy and using precious resources, to develop young players and give them a chance to become the best they can be and achieve their dreams.
All over the country, these systems are in place: from formal county age groups and academies to the less formal networks that I outlined in a piece with Leicestershire’s head of development, Jigar Naik, earlier in the season. Funded and mature — and no doubt in need of improvement in areas such as cost and accessibility — these systems have produced good young players for English cricket for decades.
As the debates intensify around franchise cricket and private investment in the game, and how it all knits together with more traditional structures, it would be wise to remember that one cannot exist without the other. All over the cricketing world, franchises are reaping the benefits of the investment of others. In this instance, Birmingham Phoenix are enjoying the fruits of Somerset’s labour.
And without Somerset's labour there would be no Hundred.
As I say, it's rare in the sporting world for teams to benefit financially from a competition in which they don't, as it were, compete.
Is it the format of the game or the fact its franchised that's causing the friction. If it was a county comp and played exclusively during August would that be ok ? So the ECB took away the 1.3 million for each county and just ran it as a normal competition ?
As for whether I "refuse to recognise the assertion that there is no pathway whatsoever to the Hundred without all the work that is undertaken by people that have nothing to do with the Hundred", it's a bit convoluted. I have never "refused to recognise" that. That strange assertion has never been put to me, as far as I am aware. No-one turns up at The Hundred as a fully-fledged, experienced cricketer. They get there by the skills they posses and the coaching from which they benefit, whether that's at school, from clubs, universities, minor counties, first class counties, ECB schemes, Chance to Shine (one of those, obviously, is very well remunerated for the work they put in).
The teams in The Hundred benefit from the development of players, wherever that development comes from. As do counties.
Again, I don't think most of the kids that turn up at The Hundred games spend too much time worrying about whether Jos Buttler developed his reverse ramp at Somerset, or had it properly coached into him in Lancashire; or whether Sam Curran learned to swing the new ball at Surrey or at Wellington College; or who should have the most credit for Adam Zampa's legspin out of New South Wales, Sydney, South Australia, Adelaide, Melbourne, Pune, Guyana or Essex.
It's probably right that the county-level development of players in The Hundred is compensated. And, for now, that compensation is set arbitrarily at £1.3m a year. I don't know how that compares with the payments counties should make for the development of their players to schools, clubs, universities, and schemes like Chance to Shine, but I imagine it compares well.
The ECB and paid commentators pretending that this is a whole new game when it actually isn't - there wasn't a single player in one of yesterday's game that didn't appear in the Blast this season. How is that different? There are very few current internationals playing because so many other countries are committed to playing matches so it has totally failed to live up to that billing. England players like Stokes and Bairstow have dropped out of playing because it isn't of sufficient importance. It will never rival the IPL for that reason. It also does not have to be run exclusively in August. The Blast isn't.
The Hundred also serves to undermine county cricket to the extent that we could see the likes of Somerset, Leics, Kent, Northants become minor counties. The ECB have to provide funding to counties come what may if they want to grow the game because otherwise there would not be any pathway to England let alone the Hundred and the ECB want to grow the game - so whether it's £1.3m or £500k there would still have to be some sort of payment made. Terrestrial coverage has been a massive bonus in bringing the game to more people but the Blast re-vamped and sold in the way that the Hundred was really would have done the job and helped the counties too grow their audience and support. Interestingly, there is no confirmation as yet from the BBC that they will support the Hundred beyond 2024 and the ECB have fudged questions as to whether they are likely to continue to do so.
Instead, we now have a situation where four competitions of top quality cricket cannot be sustained. So the 50 over game, for which there is a World Cup next year, is made up of county 2nd XI players and club and academy substitutes and where a supporter if they want to see their team play more than once in three weeks in August has to travel hundreds of miles to watch them play away. There is also talk of reducing the 4-day game to just 10 fixtures - how will that prepare the Test players of tomorrow?
Proper cricketing people like Atherton, Butcher, Pringle etc etc are recognising the damage that the Hundred is doing to the game. And as I say more people here would do so also if such a thing happened in football where you could only watch the stiffs at your club for a month right at the height of the season. There would be absolute outrage from Charlton supporters. And rightly so.
It has happened.
Charlton allowed Flanagan, Powell and Ambrose to leave early to appear for the New England Tea Men. I was livid ... actually we all were.