Ex-ECB chairman Colin Graves joins cricket private investment supporters Oakwell Sports

The former Yorkshire chief spent five years as the head of English cricket and was a major supporter of The Hundred

Colin Graves, the recently departed ECB chairman, has joined the advisory board of Oakwell Sports.

The 72-year-old spent five years as the head of English cricket before departing at the end of last summer.

Graves also founded retailer Costcutter, is an ex-chairman of Yorkshire CC and had a spell on the ICC board.

"Sport, globally, will require much assistance - both structural and financial - in the next two to three years, and Oakwell’s skill set and global outlook is ideally positioned to add significant value," he said.

"Globally, the relationship between sport and private capital needs nurturing and optimising. 

"Better commercial business models are required, as is more responsive governance. Whilst cricket has always been my passion, I look forward to sharing my sports and business experience for the benefit of Oakwell, and the wider ecosystem of leagues, investors, clubs, rights holders, and companies in all sports, globally."

Oakwell Sports, who provide corporate finance advice and claim to solve commercial challenges in sport, last summer proposed that cricket should be open to private investment.

In a report published in April 2020, they stated the 18 first-class counties were "over-reliant" on funding from the ECB and should be receptive to selling equity stakes in the eight teams competing in The Hundred.

ECB fear coronavirus pandemic could lead to £200m losses as staff cut-backs are confirmed

"The ECB should consider converting its revenue distributions to counties into equity stakes and gifting these to each county," they added. "Therefore each Hundred franchise would own its revenue distribution percentage as an equity stake too.

"This has real capital value for a county. This will attract potential private capital into buying stakes in Hundred franchises and help counties fund the overall game."

Graves was a major advocate of the new 100-ball competition, which was due to kick-off in 2020 but was postponed, and even extended his ECB tenure to fully deliver the tournament.

The assessment came as the ECB predicted losses of £200m and announced dozens of redundancies behind the scenes due to the chaos caused by the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020.

Senior figures including chief-executive Tom Harrison and director of England men's cricket Ashley Giles took pay cuts. Players meanwhile made donations and agreed to reductions in pay to assist with the shortfall in revenue.