English cricket is the envy of different sports activities as a result of success of the Hundred, in keeping with Stuart Cain, Warwickshire’s chief govt.
Cain, who joined Warwickshire in 2020, has beforehand held senior roles in rugby (each league and union), athletics, swimming and soccer, and believes that there’s a “harsh financial actuality” underpinning the Hundred – which stays a divisive competitors, with its third season dominating the month of August within the English cricketing calendar.
Every of the 18 counties is paid £1.3 million per 12 months by the ECB beneath the phrases of the preliminary settlement that underpinned the competitors. And Cain, who’s a director of Birmingham Phoenix, stated that some counties would go beneath with out these funds, and underlined his assist for the competitors.
“60% of the those that come into Edgbaston [for the Hundred] have by no means been earlier than, and the bulk are from the native space,” Cain stated. “That tells you we’re getting new individuals into video games, a way more household viewers, a way more numerous viewers.
“We have new sponsors, and we have it on free-to-air tv. Should you have been tennis or golf, and somebody stated, ‘I’ve bought a contest that brings a complete new viewers into your sports activities, takes it to individuals on free-to-air tv’, they’d say, ‘What’s to not like?’”
The Hundred’s future has been mentioned all through the primary half of the English summer time and whereas the ECB have harassed that it’s locked in till the tip of their current broadcast cope with Sky Sports activities, which runs till the tip of the 2028 season, a change of format or construction has been mooted.
“You have bought the historical past and custom of 18 counties, and then you definitely’ve bought metropolis vs metropolis, eight franchises taking part in,” Cain stated. “You are making an attempt to maneuver the sport ahead in a contemporary, modern approach however nonetheless making an attempt to respect the historical past of the sport, and it is not all the time straightforward to do this, is it?
“That is the problem for the game: how can we nonetheless maintain the ethos of the Hundred, appeal to these new audiences and produce new cash in? As a result of that cash funds the sport… each county will get a fee as a consequence of that and should you took that fee away from a few of these counties, they may…
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