ECB waits to count the cost

English cricket looks to be on a sticky wicket in the aftermath of the national team's disappointing exit from the World Cup. However much the English cricket community insists on looking through rose-tinted glasses, determined to accentuate the positive, peering through that particular glass more darkly the immediate outlook, from a financial point of view at least, is bleak.

There was a stark warning from the International Cricket Council in South Africa yesterday that the England and Wales Cricket Board faced compensation claims from all sides. Protracted legal wrangles would add costs to any pay-out following the withdrawal from the game against the Cup co-hosts Zimbabwe at the start of the tournament.

Individual World Cup matches were assigned values according to their commercial attractiveness and the ICC said: "While the Zimbabwe-England match in Harare was not perhaps one of the top category matches, because it was England it would have generated big interest and would have been worth several million dollars."

The statement added: "It is possible that the Zimbabwe Cricket Union might also bring a case of their own because they feel England's withdrawal deprived them of income. And subsequent to that the World Cup organisers may think they too have a case to recoup lost revenue. And there will be an attempt to reclaim all the costs that had to be borne during all the hearings."

But last night Tim Lamb, the ECB chief executive, came out fighting. "We feel the ICC have to share a large portion of the blame," he said. "We will defend our case robustly. We feel we have a strong legal case."

Those in the know reckon the ECB would be lucky to get away with paying out around $5m (£3.25m), but it does not stop there. If Zimbabwe and/or South Africa decided to pull the plug on this summer's scheduled tour, the ECB has said it would cost them £10m in repayments to television and loss of sponsorship and advertising. That potential loss of revenue would render ever more difficult the payment of any fine, compensation or legal costs.

There would also be repercussions on the domestic front – and there all is definitely not rosy. The ECB has yet to find a sponsor for its 45-over competition, the National League, and the 20-over thrash has one backer signed up, but it is looking for a 'family' of four sponsors, rather like the Champions' League in football. At present, the 20-20 competition, as it is called, is a one-parent family with the remaining members nowhere to be seen.

Cheltenham & Gloucester recently renewed its sponsorship of the 50-over knock-out cup, and NatWest has pledged to back one-day international series in England until 2005, the same year that Frizzell's commitment to the County Championship expires. But npower's Test-match deal runs out at the end of this summer and the company has been locked in talks for months, according to the ECB. That cannot augur well for the blue riband of the summer, since it cannot be argued that npower does not understand the product.

It is perceived, in the light of recent England failures, that as a vehicle for instigating brand awareness, Test-match cricket, and probably one-day cricket right now, is not as valuable as it once was. There is a lot of hard work ahead for everyone involved in the game.