Cricket: Fans scramble to see 'winning' England

As a successful winter gave way to spring, there were signs of a summer to savour yesterday when the England and Wales Cricket Board announced that 280,000 tickets have been sold for the series against Australia – with 90,000 gone for the two matches against Pakistan and 150,000 for the NatWest one-day triangular series.

The ECB expect sales to gather more momentum following the series win in Sri Lanka – good news for the counties, who had to take smaller pay-outs last year from the ECB because early finishes in Test matches cut revenue.

Despite the signs of a boom in the domestic game, however, the ECB is still awaiting sponsors for the county championship and one-day trophy competition but say they are "confident" of naming the new backers before the start of the coming season. The counties are to take an initial cut in compensation for the loss of players centrally contracted by England under a new scheme but will receive a match-by-match pay-out for losing players to Tests. Last summer, the compensation deal was £51,000. This year it will be £26,000, although the ECB have budgeted for last season's figure.

The elite squad will be 12 players, as it was last summer with the names likely to be announced next week.

- INDEPENDENT