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Post by flashblade on Jan 27, 2015 20:13:27 GMT
Somerset's accounts are interesting in the light of the debate a few weeks back about why Sussex burdens its accounts every year with a £500,000 paper charge for depreciation (and some counties allow for even larger depreciation sums - £1.4 million per annum in the case of Warwicks). Somerset doesn't quantify depreciation costs in its accounts - which is basically the reason why they post a healthy profit every year: www.somersetcountycc.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Annual-Accounts.pdf Their reasoning is set out in their financial report: "The committee rermain of the opinion that the County Ground is an asset that we continue to invest in, and thus do not feel a necessity to provide for depreciation of an appreciating asset." They are currently raising funds for a new pavilion and spend roughly £200,000 on "ground repairs and upkeep" evey year. I've never understood why, when you're spending subsantial sums of money on ground repairs and upkeep every season, it is also necessary to write in huge sums for depreciation on the basis of what might need to be done in 40 years time. It's a form of double counting, surely, and the approach taken by Somerset makes perferct sense to me - the ground is an asset you invest in on an ongoing basis, so why do you also need to allow half a million a year for depeciation on top of that? If a business has a policy of maintaining its property in a pristine condition, then they would argue that the property will last longer. However, there is a presumption that it will need replacing one day - even a well maintained property can become obsolete or behind the times - the test match grounds are good examples of this. In these situations, you might well argue that the depreciation charge can be spread over a greater number of years, thus producing a lower annual charge, but I don't think you can ignore it. Somerset's auditors qualify their audit report on the grounds that the absence of a depreciation charge prevents the accounts from showing "a true and fair view" of the company's financial position. |
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Post by hhsussex on Jan 27, 2015 21:04:44 GMT
If you don't identify depreciation as a charge - and you can make a case for offsetting it against varying periods of time - then you are ignoring the fact that next year, or the year after, or the year after that, etc, you must pay money for something that restores the original value of the asset. As Neil Young wrote about those who tried to ride out the consequences of their behaviour, a generation or so ago: "You're all just pissing in the wind / You don't know it but you are." |
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Post by Deleted on Jan 30, 2015 9:55:05 GMT
Wasim Khan admits he could be the last ever chief exec of Leicestershire: www.espncricinfo.com/england/content/story/824877.html "The number of members has dropped to around a thousand and Leicestershire remains heavily reliant upon the ECB for its meagre turnover: almost two-thirds of the club's total revenue - barely £3m - comes from the ECB." Huge admiration for Wasim Khan and if anyone can save Leics, I have a feeling they have chosen the right man. But he's certainly got his work cut out. My gut feeling is that the ECB is coming to the point where it is no longer prepared to bail out failing counties and within five years we will lose two of them, leaving a championship of two divisions of eight, each side playing 14 games per season. |
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Post by theleopard on Jan 30, 2015 10:28:53 GMT
My gut feeling is that the ECB is coming to the point where it is no longer prepared to bail out failing counties and within five years we will lose two of them, leaving a championship of two divisions of eight, each side playing 14 games per season. To my knowledge the ECB has never "bailed out" any county cricket club. It provides grants and loans to the counties which are in effect dividends in return for them making a huge investment in finding and developing England's future stars - James Taylor and Stuart Board being cases in point in Leicestershire's case. These England players, produced by the counties, have enabled the ECB to build up reserves of £40 million. |
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Post by Deleted on Jan 30, 2015 10:49:04 GMT
Well GIles Clarke made a statement that no county would be allowed to go under on his watch, but the position on bail-outs now seems to have altered somewhat.
Hasn't new chairman Colin Gaves already issued a coded warning to the counties to the effect that they cannot continue to rely on the ECB for the bulk of their funding and must stand on their own two feet a lot more than they do at present?
I took that to be a strong signal to counties who rely on ECB "grants" for more than 50 per cent of their income that they will have to get their act together or go to the wall. It has also been reported that ECB grants are increasingly switching to more target-based assessments in whch counties must meet certain requirements and criteria rather than simply getting hand-outs as of right.
I'd be sorry to see Leicestershire go and hope Wasim Khan can tun it around; although surely Taylor and Broad would have emerged with or without Leics CCC? They could just as easily have started their careers at Trent Bridge as at Grace Road, given that Nottingham is only about 25 miles and a 35 minutes drive away!
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Post by hhsussex on Jan 30, 2015 11:20:23 GMT
Wasim Khan admits he could be the last ever chief exec of Leicestershire: www.espncricinfo.com/england/content/story/824877.html "The number of members has dropped to around a thousand and Leicestershire remains heavily reliant upon the ECB for its meagre turnover: almost two-thirds of the club's total revenue - barely £3m - comes from the ECB." Huge admiration for Wasim Khan and if anyone can save Leics, I have a feeling they have chosen the right man. But he's certainly got his work cut out. My gut feeling is that the ECB is coming to the point where it is no longer prepared to bail out failing counties and within five years we will lose two of them, leaving a championship of two divisions of eight, each side playing 14 games per season. All good points, but Wasim Khan makes some very cogent ones: "We've become disconnected from our local communities. Not just the Asian communities, but the other communities, too. "
"But at least we are not burdened by debt - like so many other clubs "
"..there are 15,000 homes in the streets adjacent to the ground. I want to attract people from those homes with family days: we'll give them free tickets and provide entertainment for the kids and things for the mums and dads, too."
Sound familiar? Yes, they're all arguments that have been discussed in recent days on other threads on this forum in relation to the seepage of interest away from cricket and the need for a regeneration of enthusiasm -= and cash would help too! I think that ECB will get tougher, as you say, but perhaps their tough stance needs to be developed in the context of where there money goes: is it to support the development of players, as Leicester do, in which case their future might be as a kind of feeder club within a re-invented league structure, or should they be addressing why they give large loans to clubs who immediately have to use them to pay the interest on the debt they've incurred by grandiose ground developments?
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Post by theleopard on Jan 30, 2015 11:31:19 GMT
Hasn't new chairman Colin Gaves already issued a coded warning to the counties to the effect that they cannot continue to rely on the ECB for the bulk of their funding and must stand on their own two feet a lot more than they do at present? I took that to be a strong signal to counties who rely on ECB "grants" for more than 50 per cent of their income that they will have to get their act together or go to the wall. It has also been reported that ECB grants are increasingly switching to more target-based assessments in whch counties must meet certain requirements and criteria rather than simply getting hand-outs as of right. This being the same ECB that over the past 15 years or so has got the counties to bend over backwards in order to secure that funding - most notably with the now almost total non-availability of players for counties once they make it for England. The ECB that expects the counties to "get their act together" and make money through the t20 Blast and Royal London Cup - even though the star attractions are never available except for the finals. As you said on the t20 thread, one of the biggest draws for casual fans is "the best English players" - pity they are all busy playing/preparing for England during the t20 Blast. Maybe the counties should tell England they are really sorry, but they can't make any players available between May 15 and August 29 - it's the t20 Blast, and, after all, they've got some "standing on their own two feet" to do!
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Post by Wicked Cricket on Jan 30, 2015 12:28:36 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Jan 30, 2015 15:52:24 GMT
Just had a look at my atlas and you can see why Leicestershire are struggling.
Trent Bridge is 27 miles.
Derby is 32 miles.
Northampton is 35 miles.
Edgbaston is 45 miles.
You can see why Wasim Khan is concentrating on the "15,000 homes in the streets adjacent to the ground" - outside of the city of Leicester itself, they have virtually no catchment area and the neighbours are all offering better cricket.
Five county grounds within a 45 miles radius makes little sense in this day and age, even in the relatively densely populated Midlands area. Worth noting that Sussex has no rival county ground within 50 miles (with The Oval as the nearest).
To be brutally honest,if Leics went into administration, English cricket would not miss them. I know that is a horrible thing to say. But tragically it's the truth and at some point - 2019 seems to be the date being touted for a review of whether we can continue to sustain 18 f/c counties - the ECB is going to have to look at whether it is worth continuing to fund them to the tune of £2 million per annum.
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Post by theleopard on Jan 30, 2015 16:59:28 GMT
To be brutally honest,if Leics went into administration, English cricket would not miss them. Well, they are most unlikely to, as they are not in debt. Also they have slashed their wage bill so drastically that even with low support they can make ends meet. Yorkshire, on the other hand, are in up to it in their necks to the tune of around £50 million, I believe. So perhaps they should get the chop, or Hampshire or Glamorgan, who also seem to have made a pig's ear of their finances. |
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Post by Deleted on Jan 30, 2015 17:44:22 GMT
they have slashed their wage bill so drastically that even with low support they can make ends meet. Indeed, Wasim claims that they are "the third most financially stable club in the country, " although that stability is totally reliant on the ECB's largesse. And it is certainly true that they have slashed the playing budget - they have only 15 players with first team experience contracted for 2015 and they have ten players out of contract at the end of September. Leics have been sensible in refusing to borrow from their city council or anyone else to fund their proposed ground redevelopment and the appartments they want to build on the ground - you only have to look at how foolish Kent now look over rash borrowings. But the Grace Road ground is barely fit for purpose at present and the pavilion stand has been closed because it has been declared unsafe, so there is no members only area and no members bar (although as they hardly have any members, perhaps that isn't as serious a problem as it would be at Sussex!) Wasim is a realist. He admits that he could be the last CEO of the county if he fails to turn things around and says that the decision on the club's future is not in his hands because the club is not self-financing. If the ECB decides to reduce the number of counties in 2019, Leics will be number on in the firing line, not Yorks or Hants. Good luck to Leics. Jim May won't approve of Wasim's intention to give away 1000 free tickets for the Sunday of every home championship match - but it's the bold kind of initiative the struggling four-day game needs to take and I hope it works well for them. It would also be nice if they could win their first championship game for three seasons some time in 2015! |
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Post by theleopard on Jan 31, 2015 18:44:11 GMT
The ECB,
London,
30 September 2018
Dear Leicestershire CCC,
It is with great sorrow and a heavy heart that I have to inform you that Leicestershire CCC will be stripped of their First Class status from 2019.
As I am sure you are aware, over the past 20 years the business focus of England cricket has been increasingly on the national side.
We know that you provided us with some great England players down the years - wasn't James Taylor's double century at Lord's this summer a joy! - but we've made a financial decision to cut the number of First Class counties and you're getting the chop, I'm afraid.
We're aware that it's been difficult for you to attract spectators now that an England player in a county shirt is about as rare as a dodo and the international stars are also too tied up with other commitments to play county cricket.
The good news is that we're starting a new exciting t20 franchise competition from next season. We've secured a summer window when the cream of England's players and international stars will be available to play. We know that's what the counties pleaded for for the t20 Cup for years, but you know how it is once you get a paradigm shift going forward and all that.
We hope to see lots of erstwhile Leicestershire fans supporting the new competition at Trent Bridge - there's a train from Nottingham to Leicester at 11.10pm, so they should be able to get back home after a game some time after midnight. POW!
You may wonder why Glamorgan didn't get it in the neck as you made it to t20 finals day this year while they finished bottom of the County Championship for the second successive year and are drowning in debt trying to keep the SWALEC going, but we couldn't lose face by seeing it demolished.
Enclosed is your £50,000 grant for Minor Counties cricket next year. We realise you'll have to sell Grace Road to Lidl but you can always go back to Aylestone Road, so that's something to be grateful for.
Yours in sport,
The ECB
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Post by hhsussex on Feb 5, 2015 13:34:40 GMT
A setback for Gloucestershire's plans to host 2019 World Cup games, and something that should beg questions about the ECB awarding ODIs to the club for 2017, 2018 and 2109: their plans for floodlights at Bristol have been rejected by the council on grounds of light pollution and skyline impact www.espncricinfo.com/england/content/story/826761.htmlHow much of the ECB grant has gone towards ground upgrades? Gloucestershire in their last statement of accounts ( 31 January 2014) stated they had lost £122, 000 on the year and had debts of £2.5 million. In 2013 they made only £85, 000 from championship gate receipts, and £169, 000 from T20 receipts, mainly at Cheltenham whilst building work was taking place at Bristol. If neither ground has fgloodlights, what does this mean for the "Friday night appointment to view"? |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 5, 2015 14:29:51 GMT
A setback for Gloucestershire's plans to host 2019 World Cup games, and something that should beg questions about the ECB awarding ODIs to the club for 2017, 2018 and 2109: their plans for floodlights at Bristol have been rejected by the council on grounds of light pollution and skyline impact www.espncricinfo.com/england/content/story/826761.htmlHow much of the ECB grant has gone towards ground upgrades? Gloucestershire in their last statement of accounts ( 31 January 2014) stated they had lost £122, 000 on the year and had debts of £2.5 million. In 2013 they made only £85, 000 from championship gate receipts, and £169, 000 from T20 receipts, mainly at Cheltenham whilst building work was taking place at Bristol. If neither ground has fgloodlights, what does this mean for the "Friday night appointment to view"? 5 or 5.30 start and all done by 8 or 8.30. In my view, that should be the timing of all evening games. Perhaps there are a few who can't make the earlier start. But I bet they are heavily outnumbered by those - like me - who won't or can't do a 10pm finish. |
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Post by Deleted on Feb 5, 2015 14:51:58 GMT
And I see that, like Kent and Canterbury City Council, it is another case of paid council officers recommending planning approval and then elected councillors chucking it out.
Amazing how the imminence of elctions in May concentrates the minds of councillors on the fact that they are elected to look after the interests of local residents, not the money-making ambitions of professional sports clubs!
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