Giles Clarke, the ECB chairman, is to write to the ICC in the strongest terms after talks aimed at cancelling Zimbabwe’s visit to England in 2009 were presented as a propaganda victory in Harare. The board was left on the back foot by revelations of a £200,000 offer to Zimbabwe Cricket (ZC) to pull out, supposedly to avoid political problems.

With tickets for 2009 international matches scheduled to be on sale in the spring, the ECB is keen to confirm England’s plans for the first part of the season, before the ICC World Twenty20 and the Ashes series. Zimbabwe, due to play two Tests and three one-day internationals, are in exile from the five-day game because of the paucity of their performances.

The ECB considers it easier to attract potential replacements for the Test series if the new opponents – possibly Sri Lanka or Bangladesh – can stay for the limited-overs matches rather than hang around for the Twenty20 or be forced to return home briefly.

Clarke met Peter Chingoka, the ZC chairman, in Johannesburg last week and is furious that Chingoka subsequently spoke to a newspaper in his home country. An ECB spokesman said that Clarke entered into talks – at which Ray Mali, the ICC president, was present as a facilitator – on condition that sensitive details would not be released.

The report, in the Zimababwe Independent, said that the ECB was “in a quandary” after what it described as a “sweetener” to pull out had been rejected. It also claimed that the ECB was making “a desperate bid” to forestall the potential embarrassment of Zimbabwe cricketers being refused entry visas, jeopardising its hosting of the Twenty20. However, while Chingoka, who has personal connections with Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe’s President, has been barred from entering the country, there is no blanket ban on Zimbabwe sportsmen.