Yorkshire chief brands prize money in cricket '˜a joke'

Was it worth it?: Gary Ballance, who will lead Yorkshire this summer, lifting the County Championship trophy at Lords in 2015. (Picture: PA)

YORKSHIRE chairman Steve Denison has branded the prize money in county cricket as 'a joke'.

Denison believes the numbers are “derisory” and wants the England and Wales Cricket Board at Lord’s to act.

Yorkshire received £36,634 in total for finishing third in last season’s County Championship and for reaching the semi-finals of both one-day tournaments.

To put that into perspective, Leicester City earned £24,848,100 in prize money for winning football’s Premier League – roughly the same amount that Yorkshire are in debt.

“As far as prize money in domestic cricket is concerned, frankly this is a joke in just about all respects,” said Denison. “It’s terrible, and it barely pays a wage or two in some cases.

“The sponsors provide the prize money, so I appreciate that it’s difficult.

“There is a question, however, as to whether the ECB should be putting in prize money from their own funds, and I think that should be looked at.”

Yorkshire received £15,022 for finishing third in last year’s Championship, £16,212 for reaching the NatWest T20 Blast semi-finals and £5,400 for reaching the Royal London Cup semi-finals.

Even if they had done the  treble (as had seemed possible  going into the last few weeks of the season), they would have received only £293,160 in total prize funds.

To put that into perspective, a football club completing the treble of Premier League, FA Cup and League Cup would receive £26,748,100.

However, that figure would be significantly swelled by television income and gate receipts to the extent that one would probably need an abacus the size of Headingley cricket ground to calculate the overall amount.

“If you did a straw poll and asked people how much they thought Yorkshire would have got for finishing third in the Championship last season, and for reaching both one-day semi-finals, most would say £100,000-plus, even while recognising that there’s no money in cricket,” said Denison.

“But the reality is even more pronounced.

“In fact, I recently ran a little online sweep and gave four options – and less than half guessed correctly that circa £37,000 was the right number. Most thought that last year we would have achieved at least £137,000.”

When Yorkshire won the Championship in 2015, they received £158,100 in prize money – known as the County Performance Payment (CPP).

According to Denison, it barely reflects the prestige of the achievement and the efforts involved.