The suggestion by the new chairman of Sussex that a T10 competition may be one way of easing the financial concerns of the non-Hundred counties isn’t just a sign of the times. It’s a cry for help.The ECB have insisted all along that the funds raised at last year’s auction, when the Hundred was valued at £975million, would bankroll domestic red-ball cricket for a generation – an apparently powerful retort to the traditionalists who fear the tournament will devour England’s 18-team domestic set-up.But the ECB’s narrative does not tell the whole story. Far from it. In April, Daily Mail Sport revealed details of a secret meeting at Northamptonshire’s Wantage Road involving nine of the 11 non-Hundred-hosting counties.The mood was gloomy, with the clubs – almost all of them loss-making – worried about the growing divide between them and the seven host counties, a divide they worry will only grow once the Hundred’s private investors demand a greater slice of a new TV deal for 2029, and the best players migrate inevitably to the richest clubs.And while the non-host counties can in theory access around £25million each following the Hundred windfall, that money has to be spent on projects approved by the ECB, such as paying off structured debt or improving infrastructure.One source who attended the meeting, held without the knowledge of the ECB, said: ‘The feeling was that all the clubs are heading to a cliff edge at various speeds. They will all fall over one after the other if something is not addressed in the short term.’ Sussex are proposing a T10 competition to supposedly help non-Hundred hosting countiesAnd that is where Ed Warner, the new Sussex chair, comes in. Sussex were one of two non-host counties (along with Durham) to miss the secret meeting, and for good reason: they have spent much of the year trying to unravel the financial mess that led to them being placed in special measures, and docked points in all three county competitions.After telling The Guardian that the Hundred had ‘not rescued us in any way, shape or form’, Warner captured the mood that day at Wantage Road by considering ways a non-host county might stage more cricket, and make more money, during the Hundred’s nearly month-long duration – a period, at the height of summer and during the school holidays, when clubs are staging only four home Metro Bank 50-over matches.Warner wondered: ‘Why couldn’t you have a T10 triangular competition with Kent and Essex, for example? Make it very kid-friendly, make it a day at the seaside, then go and play at Canterbury, then go and play in Chelmsford.’His suggestion, though not itself discussed at the meeting, deserves full marks for lateral thinking. But it should concern cricket lovers on a few counts.The first is that it would further complicate an already insane schedule, in which the response to the introduction of a fourth format – the Hundred – has been to stage it at the same time as the 50-over competition, diminishing a format in which England are now international also-rans. Our calendar is already full to bursting, without a fifth format trying to elbow its way in.The second is that T10 feels like part of cricket’s headlong race to the bottom. Yes, Abu Dhabi has been hosting its own T10 tournament since 2017, but it has made headlines mainly for reasons of corruption, both proven and alleged. If the Hundred feels like a hurry, T10 is a sprint. What next: F5, or the toss of a coin?The third concern, and the most significant, is that Warner felt the need to air the suggestion in the first place.Forget for a moment the financial incompetence at Hove that last week led business management consultancy firm Campbell Tickell to suggest an overhaul of the Sussex board ‘as soon as is practically possible’. The format would complicate an already insane schedule and be part of cricket’s headlong race to the bottomWhat matters is that the smaller counties are having to countenance alternative means of paying the bills at a time when the ECB tell us the game is richer than ever.As one chief executive put it at the Northampton meeting, the promise of Hundred money has generated more uncertainty, not less, because of the unknown impact on the next broadcast rights deal.The ECB will blanch at the idea of counties coming up with their own fifth-format schemes, since it would entail an admission of failure by the board. But Sussex’s T10 musings are the symptom of a wider malaise – no matter the repeated insistence that the Hundred will save English cricket.Unless the ECB get to grips with the smaller clubs’ concerns, there will be more desperate ideas where that one came from.