Business News
club has only had to make a handful of employees redundant. “The secret is have you got the cash reserves to keep you going? Yes, we have.” Nevertheless, the club had always anticipated
a downturn in profits from a season with no Test Match following the Ashes of 2019, regardless of Covid. Now the Bears can look forward to the New Zealand Test from 10 June – and the anticipated launch of the new Hundred tournament at the height of summer featuring the Edgbaston-based Birmingham Phoenix. The Hundred is a new limited overs
tournament, designed to appeal to younger people. The ground is also hosting a one day international against Pakistan on 13 July, and Vitality Blast Finals Day on 18 September, with both blue riband events already sold out. Says Stuart: “The Hundred will start this year
in one form or another. I think it is a very positive thing, if you are keen to bring a new
audience to cricket. If the game does not try to innovate then it withers and dies. We need to make sure that it brings a new generation of fans in and the ECB should be applauded for that. “If you look at sports fans, they want short,
sharp bursts of entertainment.” With a new three-league format for the
County Championship replacing the previous two division model, Stuart said the red ball game remained ‘a key part of the schedule’. “You need to give the County Championship
time to breathe. It is a connoisseur’s form of cricket. The average gate is 2,000 – it’s a lot easier for people to give up a Friday night to watch a T20 game. We want to get to the point where if you said to somebody on the streets of Birmingham who are the most popular sports teams in Birmingham, I want them to say the Bears in the same breath as Aston Villa and Birmingham City.” He said Warwickshire also had to ‘reflect the
city it served’. “60 per cent of our age groups from under 10s to under 19s are South Asian. It is not just about the playing staff, it is also about the staff who work in other areas for the club. If you hold a mirror up to the club, it has to represent the community we serve. We have made inroads into that but we are not there yet. It is all about wider community engagement. We have got to make sure that we are not just here for six or seven days of international cricket.” Meanwhile, he confirmed that naming rights
for Edgbaston – with the obvious potential for boosting club coffers over a lengthy period – remained under consideration. “We need to look at whether there is an opportunity there. Edgbaston is a great, iconic sports ground and a major part of the Birmingham scene. “It is something we are actively looking at.
But you have got to get it right, with the right partner.”
March 2021 CHAMBERLINK 21
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