Counties to receive Hundred money from Thursday

Oval Invincibles have won back-to-back men's titles in The Hundred

First-class counties will begin to receive money from sales in the teams in The Hundred from Thursday.

All 18 counties are initially due more than £400,000, while Lancashire, Yorkshire and Glamorgan will also begin to see proceeds from sales of stakes in the Hundred teams they host.

The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) sold stakes in all eight Hundred teams earlier this year, raising around £520m to be split across the game.

The ECB announced on Thursday that six of the eight deals have been completed, with the purchases of stakes in Oval Invincibles and Trent Rockets to be finalised by the end of September.

Counties can take their initial £400,000 as a lump sum, or opt for a payment plan. They can spend this portion of the Hundred money as they see fit.

Bigger windfalls are due at a later date. The seven counties that host Hundred teams, plus the Marylebone Cricket Club, will receive around £18m, and the 11 non-hosts are in line for more than £24m.

The ECB has imposed "guardrails" on how this money can be spent, and counties will have to make applications for its release.

All eight hosts were given a 51% stake in their Hundred teams, which they were able to sell or keep.

Yorkshire sold all of their stake in Northern Superchargers to the owners of Indian Premier League team Sunrisers Hyderabad, Lancashire gave 70% control of Manchester Originals to the owners of Lucknow Super Giants and Glamorgan entered in a 50-50 deal for Welsh Fire with American businessman Sanjay Govil.

In Yorkshire's case, the proceeds they receive from the £100m valuation of Superchargers will start to pay down a £20m debt to the trust of club chairman Colin Graves.

The new season of The Hundred begins on Tuesday. Despite the sales, the competition will remain similar to its previous four seasons, with changes possible from 2026 onwards.

The ECB has already received applications for the names of the Superchargers and the Originals to be changed.

However, the governing body retains control of both the window in which The Hundred is played and the format of the competition, meaning it would have final say on any potential switch to 20 overs per side.

"That's one of the things that will be discussed," said Hundred managing director Vikram Banerjee.

"We have to look at what works in this country. T20 works elsewhere, but in this country the format has provided us with some really interesting things, especially from a broadcast perspective. I'm sure it will be discussed, but at the moment it's the 100-ball format and that will remain for now."

Banerjee reiterated that there are no plans to add teams to The Hundred until at least 2029, which would be the start of a new broadcast deal.

Discussions are due to begin on how players will be selected from next season. Until now The Hundred has mainly employed a draft system, but an auction could come into consideration.

Four of the eight franchises will fall under the control of owners linked to Indian Premier League (IPL) teams. Because of the political tensions between India and Pakistan, Pakistani players are not permitted to play in the IPL.

As it stands, no Pakistan players are involved in this year's Hundred. That can be explained by a number of factors: some Pakistan players pulled out of last year's competition, thus making themselves unattractive to franchises, Pakistan's men are on tour in the West Indies in August and their players are not currently highly sought after in global leagues.

And ECB chief executive Richard Gould was adamant Pakistan players would not be excluded on grounds of nationality.

"I expect players from all nations to be selected for all teams," he said. "We haven't had any need to have any discussions at this point.

"We have got very clear anti-discrimination policies within cricket in England. If those are not adhered to, our cricket regulator will take action."