MONEY, MONEY AND NO MONEY
The first serious evaluation of county cricket's financial health
Breaking News – the Leonard Curtis Cricket Finance Report is out! Mean nothing? Well Michael Vaughan was at the announcement so it must be important. And it is. It’s the first ever proper analysis of individual counties finances. (You know how I like analysis!) The authors of it – two sports finance academics, Professor Rob Wilson and Dr Dan Plumley - have used various metrics to establish relative values of counties’ financial and sporting performance over a ten year period (2014-2023) and created an index and a league table (below.) It doesn’t make good reading for Middlesex and Kent in particular – two counties with a strong playing base – although the bottom ranked teams like Derbyshire and Leicestershire must have feared the worst.
The financial criteria is based around profit/loss, debt levels, and percentage of revenue spent on staff wages. The calculations identify Leicestershire as the worst financially, with Kent not far behind. Surrey are streets ahead of any other county in the balance sheet stakes. On the field – using an index derived from a county’s finishing positions in county championship, T20 Blast and one day cup between 2014 and 2023 – Nottinghamshire and Hampshire are top. Leicestershire and Derbyshire are bottom. The combined index puts Surrey comfortably top and Leicestershire bottom. Sad to see what has become of the county of David Gower, Jonathan Agnew and (originally) Stuart Broad (though their new chief executive Sean Jarvis is working hard to turn it around.)
The authors extensive research reveals that Surrey, Lancashire and Warwickshire generated 44% (£134.6 million) of the total annual revenue of all counties (£306.1 million) in 2023. These three counties can perhaps be seen as the ‘big three’ financially in county cricket. Several counties lower down the Index rely on distributions from the ECB for most of their income. In 2023, while for Surrey this accounted for 6% of their income, 10% for Warwickshire and 14% for Lancashire, for Derbyshire it was 56%, Leicestershire 67% and Northamptonshire 71%.
The report has illustrated what many county-watchers would know and fear – a chasm in financial might between the counties that host a Hundred franchise, and the ones that don’t. But Somerset, in sixth place, have infiltrated that heavyweight group with a very strong supporter base – exploiting the lack of professional sporting competition in the area – and imaginative commercial strategies.
By contrast Middlesex, home of a Hundred franchise (although MCC actually runs London Spirit) are in 16th place, amongst a number of the poorest supported counties. Failing to exploit being based at the most famous cricket ground in the world, and surrounded by considerable playing and financial resources, their ten-year performance on and off the field is nothing short of abysmal. As someone who played for the county at various levels for over 20 years it pains me to say that. The time has come for serious action.
They should look across the Thames at Surrey, a rather poor, downtrodden London neighbour 25 years ago, who have invested shrewdly in their ground (which admittedly Middlesex, who do not own Lord’s, cannot do), have appointed excellent coaches, developed excellent players and been enterprising commercially. (They have for instance invested an estimated £170k in their live stream enabling the casual viewer as well as the diehard to follow the narrative, with consequent exponential increases in membership and viewers. The membership is now 20,000, having doubled in a decade.) They do of course benefit from their proximity to the Square Mile, and have exploited that with special offers for Friday afternoon attendance.
The Leonard Curtis report concludes with a warning from Professor Wilson: “It raises questions about the long-term viability of the county model. Investment in The Hundred may provide some medium-term relief, but only if invested strategically and to build infrastructure. Cricket in England and Wales remains overly reliant on central distributions, TV rights, and international fixtures at a handful of Test grounds. While significant profits have been posted in isolated cases over the past ten years, they are exceptions to the rule. Without ECB support and income from The Hundred, it is questionable whether some counties could survive even for a single season.”
Happily, there is advice on how to spend the influx of cash wisely, and there are positive noises about the growth of women’s and disability cricket. And since the data was analysed, a number of counties have appointed new commercial people from other sectors, lured by the opportunities to grow and monetise the domestic game. Let’s hope they don’t waste it.
A reminder – the 2005 Ashes special podcast series will be launched on this site this week for paid subscribers. Please support our work by taking out a small subscription.Breaking News – the Leonard Curtis Cricket Finance Report is out! Mean nothing? Well Michael Vaughan was at the announcement so it must be important. And it is. It’s the first ever proper analysis of individual counties finances. (You know how I like analysis!) The authors of it – two sports finance academics, Professor Rob Wilson and Dr Dan Plumley - have used various metrics to establish relative values of counties’ financial and sporting performance over a ten year period (2014-2023) and created an index and a league table (below.) It doesn’t make good reading for Middlesex and Kent in particular – two counties with a strong playing base – although the bottom ranked teams like Derbyshire and Leicestershire must have feared the worst.
The financial criteria is based around profit/loss, debt levels, and percentage of revenue spent on staff wages. The calculations identify Leicestershire as the worst financially, with Kent not far behind. Surrey are streets ahead of any other county in the balance sheet stakes. On the field – using an index derived from a county’s finishing positions in county championship, T20 Blast and one day cup between 2014 and 2023 – Nottinghamshire and Hampshire are top. Leicestershire and Derbyshire are bottom. The combined index puts Surrey comfortably top and Leicestershire bottom. Sad to see what has become of the county of David Gower, Jonathan Agnew and (originally) Stuart Broad (though their new chief executive Sean Jarvis is working hard to turn it around.)
The authors extensive research reveals that Surrey, Lancashire and Warwickshire generated 44% (£134.6 million) of the total annual revenue of all counties (£306.1 million) in 2023. These three counties can perhaps be seen as the ‘big three’ financially in county cricket. Several counties lower down the Index rely on distributions from the ECB for most of their income. In 2023, while for Surrey this accounted for 6% of their income, 10% for Warwickshire and 14% for Lancashire, for Derbyshire it was 56%, Leicestershire 67% and Northamptonshire 71%.
The report has illustrated what many county-watchers would know and fear – a chasm in financial might between the counties that host a Hundred franchise, and the ones that don’t. But Somerset, in sixth place, have infiltrated that heavyweight group with a very strong supporter base – exploiting the lack of professional sporting competition in the area – and imaginative commercial strategies.
By contrast Middlesex, home of a Hundred franchise (although MCC actually runs London Spirit) are in 16th place, amongst a number of the poorest supported counties. Failing to exploit being based at the most famous cricket ground in the world, and surrounded by considerable playing and financial resources, their ten-year performance on and off the field is nothing short of abysmal. As someone who played for the county at various levels for over 20 years it pains me to say that. The time has come for serious action.
They should look across the Thames at Surrey, a rather poor, downtrodden London neighbour 25 years ago, who have invested shrewdly in their ground (which admittedly Middlesex, who do not own Lord’s, cannot do), have appointed excellent coaches, developed excellent players and been enterprising commercially. (They have for instance invested an estimated £170k in their live stream enabling the casual viewer as well as the diehard to follow the narrative, with consequent exponential increases in membership and viewers. The membership is now 20,000, having doubled in a decade.) They do of course benefit from their proximity to the Square Mile, and have exploited that with special offers for Friday afternoon attendance.
The Leonard Curtis report concludes with a warning from Professor Wilson: “It raises questions about the long-term viability of the county model. Investment in The Hundred may provide some medium-term relief, but only if invested strategically and to build infrastructure. Cricket in England and Wales remains overly reliant on central distributions, TV rights, and international fixtures at a handful of Test grounds. While significant profits have been posted in isolated cases over the past ten years, they are exceptions to the rule. Without ECB support and income from The Hundred, it is questionable whether some counties could survive even for a single season.”
Happily, there is advice on how to spend the influx of cash wisely, and there are positive noises about the growth of women’s and disability cricket. And since the data was analysed, a number of counties have appointed new commercial people from other sectors, lured by the opportunities to grow and monetise the domestic game. Let’s hope they don’t waste it.
A reminder – the 2005 Ashes special podcast series will be launched on this site this week for paid subscribers. Please support our work by taking out a small subscription.
Re the chasm between hundred-hosters and not; is there any evidence or discussion of which came first - the hundred or the chasm? Presumably the hundred exaggerated existing gaps (due largely to test-hosting) rather than creating them?
Surrey also benefit from people based in London but originally from other parts of the country who want to go and watch cricket in good facilities when they get a spare day/afternoon/whatever, because they can’t easily watch the counties they support. I’m one such member and most of the people I watch with are likewise.
Surrey’s offering is vastly superior to Middlesex’s on that basis, and while that’s mostly not Middx’s fault for reasons you suggest, it partly is, for reasons you also suggest. So they need to do more to make up for it in other ways.