Vast financial figures have become so commonplace in contemporary sport as to be virtually meaningless. So when you see that Cricket South Africa (CSA) posted a R440.6m loss in the past financial year, it’s tempting to switch off.
Only, we should care — not least because the situation is “far worse” than the meltdown of 2018/2019, says Andrew Breetzke, CEO of the South African Cricketers’ Association, the players’ union. “It’s worse because the international landscape six years later is markedly different. Broadcast rights revenues are down. That’s why the West Indies is cutting player salaries by 25% and England has raffled off Hundred franchises to Indian owners. Boards are tightening their belts.”
Back in 2018/2019, a financial meltdown at CSA led to the precautionary suspension of then CEO Thabang Moroe and the intervention of then sport, arts & culture minister Nathi Mthethwa. He dissolved the CSA board, installing an interim board under former constitutional court justice Zak Yacoob.
One of its first orders of business was to rewrite the CSA constitution — a necessary step, given the clear need to rein in the provincial presidents by appointing more independent directors to check their power. The independents would, the argument went, run cricket for cricket’s sake rather than pursuing petty agendas. They would not allow cricket to slip into the financial swamp again.
But this is exactly what has happened, a mere six years after it was meant to never happen again. In part, that’s been because the international cricket landscape has changed drastically. Mother bodies worldwide, with the possible exception of the Board for the Control of Cricket in India, are struggling with new realities. Take Australia, where the Australian Cricket Board is considering opening its premier T20 tournament, the Big Bash, to private investment.
Here in South Africa, new tournaments like the SA20 have sprung up, jostling with more established forms on the calendar. In February 2024, for example, the SA20 clashed with a two-Test series in New Zealand. South Africa’s best players were engaged in the SA20, so what did the mother body do? It committed cricket heresy and sent a second-string team to the land of the long white cloud.
Given cricket’s increased playing opportunities, the stars have become more demanding as to where and when they play. We have entered the age of the “hired gun” or “privateer”, with no great loyalty to anyone but the paymaster. Women’s cricket has mushroomed, with CSA paying 80 full-time professionals. For reasons both without and within, cricket finds itself at financial ground zero once again.
As far as the external factors are concerned, it is common cause that TV rights revenues in the new cycle of sales will earn less than expected. The International Cricket Council (ICC), which disburses member countries’ biannual stipends in January and July, will also be releasing less money to full ICC members such as South Africa.
Add to this the fact that CSA traditionally does its forward calculations at a pegged rate between the rand and the dollar; the rand has gained strength over the past year — bad news for CSA’s coffers.
Playing politics
The current financial crisis cannot be blamed only on the changing architecture of the international game. It has also been allowed to happen because the provincial presidents have quietly reconstituted their influence. These are the men who form CSA’s Members’ Council, cricket’s second tier of government, which the new constitution was designed to limit.
An example: CSA is currently running the Pro20 Cup, which features all 15 cricket provinces as well as an emerging team of younger players. On the surface, having eight division 1 and seven division 2 provinces playing against one another can only be a good thing. But is it?
This is one of the longest domestic tournaments ever conceived, lasting from September 25 until the middle of November. But games have frequently been lopsided. And no-one watches cricket in Mbombela and Polokwane. CSA foots the bill and the provincial presidents can strut around their presidential suites saying cricket has come to Limpopo.
The Members’ Council pursued its self-interested agenda by voting off two of the board’s most vigilant members at last month’s CSA AGM. Mark Rayner and John Burke were both well-regarded independent directors. They asked awkward questions, like whether it is in cricket’s best long-term financial interests to have 15 cricket-playing provinces. One of the provincial presidents, Western Province’s Johannes Adams, recently tried to change the province’s constitution and so prolong his term of office. This was scotched by CSA’s independent board members, who rejected the amendment.
“Losing Rayner is a significant blow to CSA’s governance vision,” a source tells the FM. “As head of the financial subcommittee, he provided accountability and control.”
So bad has it become that four provinces — Border, Northern Cape, North West and Boland — failed to participate in CSA’s most recent AGM because they hadn’t had their own AGMs beforehand and were deemed, as a result, to be “members in poor standing”.
Such provinces are seldom self-sustaining. Only three — the Titans, KwaZulu-Natal Inland and KwaZulu-Natal — posted a profit in the financial year. The others drain CSA’s already overextended war chest. And what do the smaller ones like Limpopo and Mpumalanga offer in return? Only opportunities and junkets for their presidents, say detractors.
Breetzke thinks that 15 cricket-playing provinces is too many. It’s difficult to disagree. Do provinces like Mpumalanga and Limpopo add to the depth and strength of cricket’s pyramid? Probably not. An insider says: “I don’t think we’re really serving the long-term interests of the game with the Pro20. We have 240 male professional cricketers in this country. That’s more than Australia. It’s financially untenable long term.”
CSA is aware of this. As its CFO, Tjaart van der Walt, said recently: “We are further embarking on a revised financial sustainability project, looking at the entire cricket ecosystem to align CSA’s increasing cost base to the realities of current and future expected revenues.”
That’s good to know, but what Van der Walt doesn’t mention is that this isn’t only a rands and cents issue. It’s a political issue, because provincial presidents will always want to have their teams in a Pro20 domestic tournament. Turkeys don’t vote for Christmas.
World Cup wonga
There is, however, a financial ray of hope — next year’s World Cup. Beginning in October, South Africa will host 44 matches, with the remaining 13 being hosted by either Zimbabwe or Namibia. Eight of South Africa’s stadiums will be used, many of which have already been upgraded with the addition of new LED floodlights.
The lights switch on immediately and use less electricity than their predecessors. “Ours cost R71m,” says Titans CEO Jacques Faul. “They’re environmentally friendly, improve the digital TV image back home, and they’re going to save us millions in electricity because they don’t take time to warm up.”
The real World Cup price palooza will come in the form of ticketing revenue. All money gleaned from the sales of tickets accrue to the host nations, with South Africa’s slice of wonga expected to run into hundreds of millions of rand. It raises the — ahem — million-dollar question: Will the profits from next year’s World Cup ticket sales be enough to sustain South African cricket over the short to medium term?
They need to, because neither CSA’s governance structures nor its financial sustainability are cause for great hope. And the architecture of the international game is itself changing.
