Becoming a Full Member of the International Cricket Council requires significant financial investment and it's something Cricket Ireland Chief Executive Warren Deutrom is at pains to point out in the wake of the decision to scrap next year's Test match against Bangladesh.
The match will now be staged as a T20 international. On Wednesday it was announced that Sri Lanka have postponed their scheduled one-off Test match against the Irish in February. It will be rescheduled at a later date to fit in with broadcast arrangements.
If that wasn't enough, the T20 series with Afghanistan has been cancelled.
The step up to the top tier in Cricket, it would seem, has not been an easy one.
It's very much a case of securing the right investment so as to ensure being competitive as a Full Member.
Expanding further on this, Warren Deutrom told RTÉ Sport's John Kenny: "We have enjoyed competing in the Test arena since 2017. We've had to be careful in our approach to Test cricket - to be competitive - and that requires significant investment.
"In terms of output and delivery I think we can hold our head up high particularly in terms of the generation of non-ICC revenue"
"A significant cost delivered to a certain standard is demanded by the ICC in terms of how grounds and broadcasting facilities are set up.
"When you're operating in an environment which requires such extensive temporary infrastructure to be put up in grounds which aren't as yet permanent stadiums, that has a very significant cost.
"Rather than investing in temporary structures to deliver the minimum standards when hosting international cricket we'd much rather invest in programmes and people to make the game grow. At the moment in our stage of development the latter is just not feasible.
"In terms of output and delivery I think we can hold our head up high particularly in terms of the generation of non-ICC revenue. It's something Cricket Ireland has been very strong at."
So why isn't Cricket Ireland funded to a substantial degree?
Dutrom added: "The ICC works out its distribution to its members based on the money it commands from its commercial rights. It's commercial rights are sold in broadly eight-year cycles.
"Members will effectively put in place their spending plans against the money they know they are going to be receiving from the ICC.
"England, Australia and India are less reliant on ICC funding because they generate so much from their own activities. The other 102 members certainly need the ICC funding and the reality is we became a full member during the last commercial cycle.
📡 NEWS: Cricket Ireland has today announced changes to the 2020 FTP:https://t.co/fFhaPGRFGT#BackingGreen ☘️🏏 pic.twitter.com/NqJdaal0F1
— Cricket Ireland (@Irelandcricket) December 16, 2019
"A rival then effectively required a redistribution of funding from other members which therefore became politically very, very troublesome.
"The next rights cycle won't commence until 2023. We have put very, very robust arguments to the ICC to say that at the beginning we should be provided the support to realise our potential.
"Our view at the moment is that that is not currently the case. We are being stymied from delivering that potential.
"Equally, we are putting robust arguments to Sport Ireland to assist us in developing permanent infrastructures in the National Sports Campus in Abbotstown.
"Support which was promised from the government and Taoiseach Leo Varadkar is going to take time to come to fruition.
"New pitches will take time to settle. If we can build something at the Sports Campus in terms of developing a pitch in 2020, then that will hopeful be ready by 2023."
Last year the Chief Executive loaned Cricket Ireland €100,000, but strongly denied that the body was in financial plight.
"The reason for the loan last year was in relation to cash flow. The underlying issue was simply one of inadequate reserves. It was resolved within a matter of weeks.
"We don't have underlying debt. Ours is one of an annual profit & loss issue whereby we have to make sure that based on the revenue we generate in a given year - €9-9.5million for next year - that the matches we play are affordable. Happily we don't have any underlying debt."
