SaintPowelly wrote:I have every sympathy with Durham fans, as with just about every sporting collapse its the innocent fans who suffer the most. I experienced it myself with Southampton in 2007-2008.
In the case of Durham, I don't have a clue of what has happened. I know you got fined for breaching the wage barrier, how did that happen? you haven't had a marquee signing in a while (if I remember Kumar was really cheap as we wanted to adapt to English conditions ahead of the test series) Presumably your core players Colly, Onions, Rushworth, Rocky, Borthwick and Stokes are rinsing the club
IF this is the case and it is self inflicted then I think the points deduction is fine, it sets a terrible precedent if sides rack up massive debt without major repercussions.Did Hampshire benefit from Durhams problems? yes, but I wish we hadn't, we were the 2nd worst side in the league and deserved to go down.
I cannot find a definitive explanation of the salary Cap breach but the extract below describes how it happened. It was self declared at the time it was discovered .There were strong suggestions that other counties were also breaching but not declaring or being found out by E.C.B. as they, reportedly, did not routinely monitor this area or possibly turned a blind eye because it was the richer counties that were transgressing.
"Despite this discrimination there will be those, many within the ECB, who feel that counties must live more within their means. Citing Durham’s 2012 breach of the
£1.8m salary cap, a playing bill they could ill-afford and which saw them fined, they feel the club has, on occasion, been reckless in their spending.
Harker counters this by claiming that Durham had several England players, who had been on central contracts with the ECB, return to the club that season, thereby unexpectedly adding to the wage bill. He also points out that such profligacy has not gone unchecked and in 2014 Durham’s wage bill, net of national insurance and pensions, was
£856,500, which made them the lowest in the First Division and 13th of 18 overall." from an article in the Cricket Paper April 29th 2016.
This was at the time when Onions was in and out of the England set up and managing his salary was tied up with ECB payments , Harmison was at the end of his 4 year contract after losing his central contract,Blackwell cost a lot and they had Benkenstein ,Di Venuto on the books still.
I do not think the players you named above were being payed too mush as the salary bill during their time has been one of the lowest in of all the Counties ,as pointed out in the extract.
Partially self inflicted but also caused by an ambitious business plan predicated on the requirement to compete for Tests and develop and maintain a ground that met those needs. The ambitious of nearly all counties who have been expansionist in ground improvements (like Hampshire, Warwickshire, Glamorgan and Yorkshire), have run into similar difficulties. Also no 'sugar daddy' to inject much needed funds to underpin the costs.