These days when you look into Giles Clarke’s eyes it is easy to see the dollar signs glinting away. His complete disregard for what is best for cricket in the face of a big pile of cash is worrying to say the least. Clarke selling his soul and the selectors collectively selling their brains is unlikely to prove to be a positive move for English cricket.

The chairman of the ECB should, logically, be the man who knows the most and cares the most about cricket in the country, making Clarke a strange choice to begin with. This is the man who sold the UK’s cricket rights exclusively to BSkyB, alienating millions of the new viewers England’s Ashes success in 2005 had won and making cricket once more an elitist interest.

A barrier that it had taken years to break down in the first place was put back up with the signing of a few contracts. English cricket’s chance to gain previously unthinkable popularity was snatched away with a waggle of a large cheque under the ECB’s nose. Perhaps this should have been a warning sign that the ECB’s new chairman is happy to choose a large cash sum over what is best for the future of the game of cricket.

The recent suggestions of the chairman include abolishing the County Championship, making three divisions with no trophies, promotion or relegation to play for or returning to three-day cricket. The four-day and five-day games are the foundation on which domestic and international cricket are respectively built and this kind of debilitating move could have catastrophic consequences. Oh, but if we fill the gaps with more Twenty20 matches and make a pile of cash, then that is OK, according to Mr Clarke at least.

Sir Allen Stanford’s billions, not his knowledge of cricket, have granted him leave to make all kinds of ridiculous suggestions, such as reducing 18 counties to six franchises and playing an English Premier League that could be "bigger than the IPL". Complete rubbish. Someone needs to tell Sir Allen that we already have one Premier League full of overpaid foreigners and that is plenty. English cricket fans enjoy the domestic scene exactly how it is and if something isn’t broken, you shouldn’t try to fix it.

Someone needs to tell the ECB that the reason we are cricket fans is that we like cricket. We want our cricket maintained and looked after so we can continue to enjoy it. We don’t want a summer of Twenty20 matches with a couple of three-day games thrown in, and we don’t want franchises or an English Premier League. We like our cricket just the way it is and look to them to protect that. Let’s hope no one with a large cheque book tells them otherwise.