I have pulled together a spreadsheet summarising income and costs for the 18 first class counties. Data is taken from the most recent financial statements, with the exception of Surrey who have just filed their financial statements for the period to 31 January 2017, I'll update this post once I have a copy of these Surrey accounts. Middlesex don't seemed to have filed accounts for the period to 31 December 2016, although I think these are now overdue.
A few points on the aggregate figures.
The 18 first class counties made a combined loss before tax for the period of £2.6m. Viewed in isolation this doesn't look too bad but it includes a Surrey profit of £3m. Also most counties have taken on a significant amount of debt in the last decade. For the counties making a loss / small profit the issue is are they able to pay off the debt as it falls due. A particularly pertinent question for Durham, Glamorgan (both of whom have almost gone belly up in the last two years) and Warwickshire all three lost £1m+ in 2016. Just looking at one years figures is a bit reductive (there is a general consensus 2016 wasn't a great year because of the tours) so I will expand and provide some balance sheet analysis in future posts.
Also interesting is how much internally generated revenue the counties produce. For 2016 total revenue for all 18 counties is £142m of which ECB grants makes up £40m, about 28%. For a county like Surrey the ECB's money is nice to have but not a massive slice of total revenues and even for a non - test county ECB grants generally make up about half, perhaps a little less of total revenue. And even if the county structure was swept away the ECB would still need to fund first class cricket, a national youth development system and keep a number of grounds able to hold test match crowds.
You can upload my figures here , I have a pretty full set of county financial statements so if anyone would like to see what there county is up to, let me know.
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