Last week, during our latest LV= Insurance County Championship match at Merchant Taylors’ School, the Club held its annual mid-season forum for members, where a panel of the Club’s Directors and Senior Executive were on hand to issue an update to members on any matters of interest and to answer any questions from the members in attendance.
The panel comprised Chief Executive Officer, Andrew Cornish, Interim Chair, Angus Fraser, Director of Cricket, Alan Coleman, Chief Financial Officer, Illa Bhardwaj, and the Club’s Senior Independent Board Director, Richard Sykes. The following summary covers all the areas discussed.
Firstly, Angus Fraser welcomed members to the forum and thanked Merchant Taylors’ School for hosting us this week, informing all members that the development of the new Julian Hill Cricket Centre at the school is progressing well, and will be finished and ready to be utilised by the Middlesex squads for winter training from the end of this season onwards.
He reminded members that as always, the members’ forums we hold are private events, for the exclusive benefit of the Club’s members, with confidential information and updates often discussed, so as was asked of those in attendance, we would respectfully request that any information included within this summary remains within the membership and is not shared outside of the Club.
He then gave an update on the appointment of the Club’s new Chair, advising all in attendance that the process for finding Mike O’Farrell’s permanent successor was close to completion. He explained that there were a number of governance matters the Club were currently having to deal with, relating to the historical management of the Club, which would impact on the timing of the new Chair starting in the role, with Fraser explaining that the Club wished to resolve these historical governance issues before the new Chair took residence. He also acknowledged that the historical issues the Club were now working to resolve was having an impact on the level of support and resource the Club can provide to the cricket department and hoped that once this was resolved the situation would improve. He advised all present that the CEO would expand upon these issues when he spoke.
Fraser then passed the baton to Alan Coleman, to provide an update on the progress of the Club’s cricket department.
Coleman began by summarising the challenges the Club has faced in coming to terms with life back in Division One of the County Championship and the changes we are trying to incorporate into our style of play to address this, namely, to play with greater positivity and assertiveness with the bat. He acknowledged that we had been desperately short of runs this year in the top order, which he felt wasn’t helped by a lack of competition for places, with no fewer than thirteen days of Second Eleven cricket lost to the weather so far this year. With the ball he acknowledged that our attack has a shortage of genuine pace and too much similarity in the attack, whilst opposition were benefitting from that extra firepower our attack is lacking, with acknowledgement also given to suffering from the lack of an experienced spinner.
In the T20 format, Coleman explained that he was encouraged by the progress the side has made, playing a new and attacking brand of cricket, which started to reap rewards towards the end of the campaign, with the young side developing well and competing, winning three of our last four South Group matches. We are scoring more runs than ever before in the T20 format, are scoring at a faster rate than ever before, and our batters’ strike rates have never been higher. Again, we’ve suffered from a lack of international experience in the side, however he was pleased with the overall progress the side had made and is hopeful that this will continue moving forwards, especially when we can complement the existing group of players with the addition of some specialist players when finances allow.
Coleman confirmed that in the fifty over format we were hopeful of being able to compete with our existing resources, taking the positive style of play from the T20 format into the longer white ball format. Both Stephen Eskinazi and Tom Helm had already been called up to Hundred franchises, so would be absent, and imminently it would be announced that Max Holden would be joining the pair of them at the Hundred, with him joining up with the Manchester Originals squad in August. Other than the three of them, we are hopeful that the rest of the squad will be available for Middlesex, giving us a good blend of experience and youth to select from.
Questions were then taken from the floor, with one member raising his concern about the impact that such a run of defeats in the T20 format would have on this young group of players and how would they be negatively impacted by it. He also asked whether we felt it was fair to expect them to compete at the highest level without the support of specialist international cricketers to bolster the team’s prospects.
Coleman said the players had responded well to the challenges, and whilst losing was tough for them to take, they had remained strong, had all brought into the way we are playing, and the group were together and had belief in the direction we are moving in. Coleman acknowledged that overseas talent and also high-quality domestic talent was needed and would be sought, and hoped are that this would not be an issue next season when the Club’s finances were on a stronger footing and the Club could look to strengthen through recruitment again.
A question was then asked about Keshav Maharaj, who was unable to join the Club after sustaining a serious and long-term injury, questioning whether the reason for him not being replaced was purely based on finance. Coleman acknowledged that this was a large part of it, however this decision was also influenced by the difficulty in the Club being able to find an available replacement who could do the job as well as Maharaj would have done for the same cost outlay.
A question was then asked about the three players we had announced would be leaving the Club and Coleman was asked to expand on the reasons why they had been let go. He explained that all three players had not progressed as quickly or as much as the Club would have hoped they would, and stated that none of them had been excelling and dominating in Second Eleven cricket as they should be if they were to warrant further extensions to their terms. Coleman also acknowledged that at this stage there were no plans to release any other players, however, whilst hopeful, could not guarantee that this would remain the case.
Andrew Cornish then addressed the room, beginning with an honest and open update on the problems the Club are currently looking into, investigating historical poor management, finance, and governance under the Club’s previous administration. The last eighteen months since Cornish’s and Bhardwaj’s appointment as CFO have been spent forensically analysing the historical financial management and governance structures of the Club, to build a fuller picture on the extent of the problems that exist from the previous administration. As has been widely publicised already, the previous administration oversaw a significant error in historic pension payments which needed to be addressed at significant cost to the Club, however since investigating and rectifying this, further issues have come to light. The last six months has been spent investigating these matters, working closely with the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) and the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in regard to these establishing the extent of these historical issues, and this investigation and audit of the Club’s previous administrative procedures is now close to completion, at which point a public statement will be issued. This will cast the Club in a difficult light, as certain historical issues around poor governance and financial mismanagement come to light, however this has been as essential process to go through to get us to this point, where we can now move forward as a Club with robust financial structures and governance in place.
Cornish also discussed the publication of the Independent Commission into Equity in Cricket report, which was publicly released approximately two weeks ago. He gave assurances that the ICEC report’s findings were important for the game at large, and that the game had to act, and that we as a Club were committed to doing all that it can to ensure we provide a welcoming and inclusive environment for all, building on the good work that is already being delivered within the Club’s long-standing ED&I Activation Plan.
Questions were then taken from the floor, with the first question asking about the relationship with Marylebone Cricket Club and how supportive were they being as our partners.
Cornish explained that the relationship with MCC was in a very good place, with the relationship more on a partnership footing that on a tenant/landlord footing as it had perhaps previously been. Fraser added that he felt that MCC were committed to helping us be a successful side on the field, with them valuing what Middlesex Cricket adds to their own membership.
The Strauss High Performance review was asked about, with some clarity sought on how the future of the domestic structure looked. Cornish confirmed that the structure of the 2024 season had already been confirmed and that the early indications were that there would likely be Championship cricket in every month of next season. Coleman added that some of the elements of the Strauss review were already being seen this season, such as the Kookaburra ball trial and the change in points across the County Championship, however the two proposals to amend the domestic schedule, which were the two most contentious points the review raised, had not been approved and were not currently being discussed.
Another question raised concerns over the current regulations around the loan system, given that a lot of players were moving from county to county throughout the season and not staying with their parent club. Coleman acknowledged that the Club has voiced these concerns with the ECB and shared these views, and conversations were ongoing as to how this system should operate more effectively.
One member asked about the Annual Review publication and Season Guide publication and said that the Club should seriously think about producing these as digital publications to save money. Cornish acknowledged that the Club were currently looking into these matters, reviewing the results of the recent members survey that was sent out, and would determine what it felt was right for the majority of members and would then advise members accordingly in due course.
One question was asked about the Club’s financial strategy moving forwards, given that the Club has relatively fixed income streams. Cornish began by reaffirming that the Club has been committed to reducing costs and improving efficiencies to this point and that the Club’s business plan moving forwards would focus on growth now that the Club’s cost base had been reduced and was under control. He confirmed that the Club was committed to supporting the cricket department, however he acknowledged that long-term growth would be needed to sustain a continued increase in investment in the playing staff. The Club would be looking closely at its key commercial assets, such as its live stream and its commercial partnerships, to determine how we can maximise the most value from each asset, as it would with the membership, to determine how we can maximise value for members whilst increasing potential revenue growth for the Club.
Bhardwaj added that the Club’s short-term strategy was to turn around the Club’s fortunes, by getting a tight control of the Club’s cost base, whilst also ensuring that we become profitable and begin to build up our reserves again. We are currently reviewing all non-cricket revenue growth areas in our medium and long-term strategy, to diversify our potential growth from non-traditional areas, to ensure we are less reliant on pure cricket revenue. No stone would be left unturned as we look to diversify the income streams that the Club can leverage and maximise.
A question was raised in relation to the historic governance issues that Fraser and Cornish spoke of earlier, specifically in relation to the Board Directors who were in post at the Club throughout the period when that poor governance took place, and whether their positions on the current Board were being considered. Cornish explained that the Club, as part of this process, would be commissioning a full and thorough independent audit, which would look closely at everything, including responsibility for when the issues occurred. Sykes then added that collective responsibility had been taken by the Board, operating under previous administration, and that the conversations we have been having in recent months with the ECB in aiming to resolve these issues had involved them looking at the make-up the Club’s Board, examining the roles that current standing Board Directors had played in the historic issues. He confirmed that the ECB were satisfied that the changes the Club had made to its Board over the last twelve months, which has seen several Board Directors depart and several new Board Directors join.
With that being the last question tabled to the panel, Interim Chair Fraser then thanked all those in the room for attending and for their ongoing support of the Club and the meeting was brought to a close.