Cricket Has Done Well Financially

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32392, 3 September 1970, Page 9

Cricket Has Done Well Financially

(By R. T. BRITTENDEN) The financial loss on the tour of the Australian B team last season was a heavy one, but it was caused chiefly by poor weather, and is certainly no indication of a decline in cricket’s health. New Zealand has achieved some encouraging financial successes with its cricket, as well as on the field, in recent years.

The post-war years have been extraordinarily busy ones in New Zealand cricket; in 25 seasons, no fewer than 23 visiting teams, as well as making seven major and two minor overseas tours.

The total loss on last season’s working was $lO,OOO but at the last annual meeting of the New Zealand Cricket Council in October, 1969, it was possible to allocate $BOOO from tour profits to major and minor associations and $lO,OOO to the touring reserve fund. This represented the profit from the West Indies tour of 1968-69 a substantial $lB,OOO. Two seasons earlier, there was a profit of $7900 from the tour of the Australian B team, and in 1967-68, when India made its first visit to New Zealand, the surplus was $5500. There was a loss of $lO,OOO when New Zealand visited Australia in 1968. There was a substantial profit on the long tour of England, India and Pakistan last season and every reason to expect the two-test visit of the M.C.C. team in the coming summer to more than pay its way. Although at club and provincial level, rising costs are posing difficult problems, the structure of New Zealand’s international cricket, far more

substantial now than ever before, is such that it can and does provide finance for the game throughout the country.