Colin Graves has started his final year as chairman of the England & Wales Cricket with a stark warning to the next government about the danger of listing Test cricket on free-to-air television.

Graves has told Telegraph Sport that forcing the ECB to put Test cricket on terrestrial television would bankrupt the game at every level.

The House of Lords communication and digital committee last month called for the Ashes to be shown on terrestrial television and returned to listed status meaning it cannot be sold to satellite broadcasters. Ian Lucas, the MP for Wrexham, called on the ECB to not take Test cricket off free-to-air television again when Graves and Tom Harrison, the chief executive of the ECB, appeared at a government select committee hearing in October.

Now Graves, who ends his five-year term as chairman in November 2020, has warned the next government not to interfere in how the sport sells its rights and believes the eight matches in the Hundred and two England Twenty20 matches that will be shown live every year by the BBC from next summer is enough.

“One of the first things I said as chairman was we want cricket back on terrestrial television. We have done it but Test cricket on terrestrial television is a totally different ball game,” he said. “If you talk to broadcasters, none of them want it. It does not fit into their schedules. The cost to do a Test match is astronomical from a broadcasting point of view. For a five-day Test you are talking production cost of a million quid so there is not going to be a queue even if they push it that way.