On Cricket: Although the weather might not convince you, we are now well into the cricket season with a hectic 12 months ahead, particularly for the national side, and everything leading up to the 2007 World Cup in the West Indies next March. But it was also a busy off-season for Irish cricket with plenty happening on and off the field.

Last October the InterContinental Cup was won in Namibia, in February the next generation of Irish cricketers were in action at the Under-19 World Cup in Sri Lanka and then just coming into the season the Irish Cricket Union's first chief executive Peter Thompson departed after it came to light that his contract was not going to be renewed this year.

The failure of Thompson to attract enough sponsorship and implement an effective marketing strategy for Irish cricket is as much a failure on the part of the ICU as it is on the man himself. In many ways Thompson came into the job too early as the amateur-run ICU just wasn't ready for a full-time professional manager.

Now the management committee has just drawn up a job spec for the new CEO with the view to advertising the position next month but the truth is that the ICU is still not ready.

At present the ICU executive committee is made up of 20 people (chairman, vice-chairman, honorary secretary, treasurer, finance committee chairman, cricket committee chairman, two public relations officers, strategic planning committee chairman and 11 elected delegates, four each from Leinster and the NCU, two from the north-west and one from Munster).

Because the 11 delegates are elected by their home unions, there is the danger that they will vote parochially and there is often conflict along geographical or political lines rather than on what is strictly best for Irish cricket.

This must change if cricket here is going to build effectively on the success of the senior national team.

Firstly the executive committee needs to be replaced by a nine-person management board that will oversee administration of the game for men and women on this island.

The board would be made up of a chairperson, honorary secretary, treasurer, finance chairperson, cricket chairperson and four delegates. These delegates must be elected, not by the regional unions but at the ICU annual general meeting, so that they will each have a national mandate rather than having always to refer to the home unions that put them there.

This will involve serious constitutional change within the ICU as many committee men will lose their places but it is about time a more streamlined approach is taken to how the game is administered in this country. And it's not just my opinion.

The Irish Hockey Association is a good example of how a sport can progress if the correct structures are put in place. By the time Paul Varian became the IHA's first chief executive in November 2004 the old 24-person executive had been replaced with nine on the recommendations of a Genesis report, similar to the one adopted by the FAI.

This nine-person board is backed up by three standing committees and an advisory council made up of representatives of all the other stakeholders such as umpires, regional associations, schools and so on.

"It has worked very well," said Varian. "We are able to do things a lot quicker and more effectively. There are enough people to ensure quality but not enough to slow things down."

Since the IHA introduced this structure they have managed to attract more sponsorship and through that increased revenue they are now looking to bring more professional executives on board. They are currently advertising for a full-time marketing manager.

No one doubts the hard work and genuine sentiments of the amateurs running Irish cricket. The game, at all levels, depends on the goodwill, time and skills of countless numbers of unpaid workers and it would be a mistake not to recognise that.

But it is vital that the game's administrators accept that in this modern age it is time to adopt a more professional approach or risk being left behind.