Former England and Wales Cricket Board chief executive Tim Lamb believes county members must look at “the bigger picture” when considering the game’s future.
Lamb says the commercial potential of the domestic T20 competition, introduced in 2003, has not been fully exploited, compared to tournaments like the Indian Premier League.
And Lamb believes the proposed sale of franchises for The Hundred must go ahead as it will also produce a huge boost in income for the county clubs.
“Some people have talked about the monster we created but I think it’s a shame the ECB didn’t capitalise on what was our invention,” Lamb told BBC Radio Northampton’s The Cricket Show.
“I think we were prisoners of cricket politics, the way the county system works, and it’s not the first British invention that’s then been exploited by others and we’ve been left behind. The IPL, no one could have foreseen that (at the time).
“The sale of the franchises is going to provide the first-class counties with undreamt -of amounts of money which hopefully will be spent responsibly by those counties.”