Cuts at the Oval

It seems the rumours of the last few months that Surrey would be cutting budgets and staff were accurate, the Telegraph has reported that 20 staff are being let go. Out of a total of 95, that is a very significant reduction.

The first to go was apparently Gus Mackay, the Managing Director. Now Gus has been the target of much ire on the message boards over the last couple of years and I'm not quite sure why. I once emailed him a furious rant about how rubbish the match reports on the website were. Not only did he reply personally and make sure the error was corrected, he also called me a week later to talk through some other issues. To front up and talk to some average Joe like me was a bold move, I don't know how many other Managing Directors do that, but I bet it isn't many.

That a further 19 people are also on their way out of the door is of course extremely sad news for them. I can imagine for many of them working for Surrey was a fun and interesting job, some of them might even have considered it an honour, this is not a happy time for the club.

There are also reports of a £200k cut to the cricket budget and a settlement being reached to allow the departure of Andre Nel (to Essex). A cut in the budget will make recruitment over the winter tricky for Adams, and although Nel hasn't taken the wickets he should've done, he always gave his all for the team and he'll be missed.

I think Surrey are financially speaking, in a much better place than many counties up and down the country, especially considering our lack of success on the field in recent years. But that we are still cutting such significant numbers of staff and budget shows where cricket is. The ECB and the counties have some seriously hard thinking to do on how to make cricket a more profitable exercise in this country.