The ECB introduced central contracts in 2000. Under the central contracts system the best players remain "associated" with a county but the ECB pays their wages, controls when they play and provides coaching. Central contracts have also improved the pay of England players relative to their county colleagues .
In the 17 years since their introduction central contracts have increased in numbers and were extended to England's elite women cricketers in 2014. The ECB's accounts for the period to 31 January 2017 showed 42 cricketing employees compared with 12 central contracts in 2000.
The introduction of central contracts was a belated recognition of the centrality of the England teams to cricket in Britain, both as the focus of interest and drivers of revenue. The point of central contracts was to improve playing standards. On the original introduction of central contracts Simon Pack, then England International Teams Director, said:
"Centrally contracting international players has worked successfully in other leading Test playing countries such as South Africa and Australia and we believe it can help the England team be more consistent. England contracts will give the England management team more control over fitness and training programmes, foster a greater sense of unity amongst the players and promote the development of a settled team behind which the cricketing public can unite."
With 17 years of evidence available it might be possible to draw some tentative conclusions as to whether central contracts have improved playing standards. The detailed section of this post: looks at some research on central contracts by the University of Sheffield Hallam, updates this and suggests some alternative measures. Eventually I try to come up with a (very tentative) range for the impact of central contracts. My conclusion is central contracts have improved England performance by between 0 and 20%, with perhaps the most likely outcome being between 5% and 15%.
An interesting question is: Is the level of improvement appropriate given the resources committed? I've nothing to make a proper judgement on this, but a few thoughts:
- The impact of ECB contracts seems a little disappointing. With the exception of India, England has more resources than any other cricket playing country and unlike India it isn't trying to produce a successful sporting side in, what remains, a poor nation. Yet England generally pottles along at 3rd or 4th in a test match table of 10 sides. This seems lacklustre compared to the improvements in, say, British cycling utilizing a national squad approach rather similar to central contracts.
So why haven't central contracts had a greater impact?
- One possibility is that in cricket it is hard to improve performance. Track cycling is a controlled affair where success can be achieved by maximizing an equation of power, mass and wind resistance. In cricket a team's performance has all sorts of variables with positive and negative feedbacks and the performance of 11 individuals acting as a unit has to be optimized.
- Another possibility is just that the ECB hasn't made good use of central contracts. In researching this blog I noted Lancashire leg spinner Chris Schoffield was one of 12 individuals to receive an original central contract. The current England squad includes leg spinner Mason Crane (first class bowling average 41 batting 10). Even after 17 years, English cricket is still hunting for unicorns.
Judging the Performance of Central Contracts
Some research on this issue has already been done by The University of Sheffield Hallam.
The University examined the two 13 year periods either side of the introduction of central contracts and found:
"Both the stability and performance of the England test side improved considerably in the sample period post contracts."
The data the University provides, supports their conclusion. Marking results on a simple scale of 2 points for a win, one for draw and 0 for a defeat they calculate the England averaged 0.79 points per game in the 13 years before central contracts compared to 1.17 in the 13 years after central contracts. Using cricinfos excellent statsguru the points comparison can be brought up to date by comparing the 17 years either side of central contracts. As an additional check it is possible to compare pre and post central contracts periods in terms of games played rather than periods of time (The 1979 - 1999 column below).
| 2000 - 2017 | 1983 - 1989 | 1979 - 1999 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Won | 98 | 26 | 50 | |||
| Lost | 69 | 43 | 83 | |||
| Drawn | 56 | 38 | 86 | |||
| Points | 252 | 90 | 186 | |||
| Games | 223 | 107 | 219 | |||
| Points per game | 1.13 | 0.84 | 0.85 |
The improvement is slightly less marked when the records are compared over 17 rather than 13 years but the overall trend is still apparent and basing the sample on games played pre and post
central contracts makes very little difference. A crude comparison would indicate central contracts improved results by 33%.
But results improving after the introduction of central contracts doesn't prove central contracts caused the improvement. The Sheffield Hallam approach to the issue of causality is to measure consistency of selection over the two periods as well as results. Their finding is that changes per game declined from 2.8 in the pre central contracts era to 1.5 post central contracts. This finding combined with interview evidence supports a contention that central contracts improved performance rather than simply preceding it. And if the interplay of consistency of selection and performance is difficult to untangle there are other attributes of the central contracts package, improved relative pay for elite performers in particular, where the likely direction of causality is more apparent.
But although there is evidence to suggest central contracts improved performance post 2000 this is not to say all of the improvement was the result of central contracts. An issue the Sheffield Hallam paper keeps clear of is how to allow for performance being relative. That is, a big reason for a result is the strength of the opposition.
In some instances it might be acceptable to just assume the standard of opposition is roughly equal across periods but in comparing 1979 - 1999 to 2000 - 2017 this is particularly problematic. In the period 1979 - 1999 England played 41 matches against a West Indian team, seen as one of the best test sides ever, and won just 7. The West Indian period of dominance persisted until their defeat in the 1994 - 1995 series against Australia. But unfortunately for England this just marked the emergence of a superlative Australian side, in the period 1979 - 1999 England played Australia 46 times winning just 10. Australian dominance persisted for the 1st part of the period 2000 - 2017 but since the retirement of Glen McGrath and Shane Warne in 2007, international cricket has lacked an apex predator. Also in the period 2000 - 2017 England played 10 games against Bangladesh (winning 9) and won all but one of four games played against Zimbabwe. [In the earlier period England didn't play Bangladesh and played two drew two against Zimbabwe ; on the flipping murdered them tour?]
So there seems to be a disparity in the standard of opposition between the two periods but how to allow for this in calculating the impact of ECB contracts? One possibility (had I the maths) would be to do some sort of regression analysis. But I would have thought that this would still require a subjective decision on how much harder it was to win cricket matches in the 1979 - 1999 period than it was in 2000 - 2017. That is I think the West Indies in 1983 - 1995 were a lot better than any side currently playing test cricket but its perfectly reasonable to argue that cricket has moved on and the West Indian side wouldn't dominate modern cricket. Ultimately it's a question of feel.
One possible solution is to use rankings as a basis for comparing performance rather than the simple points approach of the Sheffield Hallam paper. Using rankings doesn't get around the performance of opponents quandary completely as rankings are also a relative measure and a dominant team will hog the available points, making their opponents look like poor sides. But at least using rankings means that beating the West Indies in 1990 scores more points than beating the West Indies in 2017 and performances against new test teams like Bangladesh will be weighted downwards. Also rankings typically reward a win to clinch a series with more points than a win in a dead rubber, recognising the series rather than the match is the measure of test match performance.
Ideally I would use the ICC rankings to compare performance pre and post central contracts but I couldn't find any ICC country rankings over time. Instead I used the rankings from the website Idlesummers, the methodology used is here.
| 2000 -2017 | 1983 - 1999 | 1979 - 1999 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Years | 17 | 17 | 21 |
| Aggregate ranking | 20118 | 16678 | 21375 |
| Average | 1183 | 981 | 1018 |
The upward trend in performance post 2000 compared with 1983 - 1989 is still marked but not as marked as in the Sheffield Hallam paper. The distinction between the two periods is further moderated by going back to 1979 although it does need to be borne in mind that England had a number one world ranking in 1979 when the West Indies and Australia were involved in World Series Cricket.
So what conclusions, if any, can be drawn about the impact of central contracts on England team performance?
I would tentatively suggest that the rankings approach perhaps put a ceiling on the impact of central contracts of somewhere around 20%. But that probably overstates the true impact as it doesn't allow for changes in the quality of opposition pre and post central contracts.
So what might be a floor for the impact of central contracts? I would say it might be possible to argue that central contracts have had no impact at all. If you wanted to go down that road you might point to this
You could argue this shows England performance fluctuates with no particular pattern and is determined by the international spread of cricketing talent over which the ECB has no control. There was an unusual slump in relative performance in the 1980s and early 1990s as England were squeezed by the West Indies and Australia (and some good Pakistan sides) but things were returning to normal before central contracts were introduced.
Personally I wouldn't go this far, it's easy to think of reasons why central contracts should improve performance but any explanation of why they would harm performance is a little convoluted. Also there does seem to be a upward trend in results once you look past the inevitable volatility. So my guess would be central contracts have improved performance but only a bit, perhaps 5% - 10%. But it's surprising how eventually the judgement is made on feel rather than the "facts"
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