THERE are no certainties in sport, but any county with serious ambitions to win the championship in 2009 could take a giant leap forward by signing the Sri Lankan spin sensation Ajantha Mendis. Mendis, who collected the International Cricket Council’s emerging player award last week, is not expected to be required by Sri Lanka for the World Twenty20 in June. He could sweep 100 wickets for whichever club secures his services. Sussex and Lancashire are interested, but in these situations money tends to talk, and nobody is richer than Surrey.

Unfortunately, Surrey are all but out of the race. If they don’t beat Notts in their final match this week, they will have gone through a season winless for the first time; even if they win, relegation is all but assured. There is little chance of Mendis signing for a Division Two club. This on-field demise is extraordinary.

Commercially, the club is a powerhouse. Its chief executive, Paul Sheldon, is the best-paid administrator in English cricket. Its revenue of about £22m last year was unmatched by any other county. Most of its income derives from international matches, but gate receipts from Twenty20 matches reached an impressive £1m this season. The Oval has been extensively modernised. The club has planning permission for a further redevelopment that includes a hotel.

The contrast between the commercial and cricketing sides is stark. Not long ago, Surrey were the main provider of players to the England team. That river has long since run dry. Figures produced by Leicestershire’s chairman, Neil Davidson, reveal Surrey as among the worst offenders when it comes to giving opportunities to young home-grown players. It is five years since a Surrey player won a first Test cap for England. Even though they own one of the best county academies, there is no sign of that drought ending. Surrey have an unhappy knack of turning stars into black holes. Witness the fates of Rikki Clarke, Scott Newman and James Benning.

After five years without a trophy, and one season in Division Two in 2006, the club has acknowledged the need for action. Last week Gus Mackay, 41, a former Essex and Zimbabwe cricketer-turned-administrator, was recruited from Sussex and given charge of all cricketing affairs – direct acknowledgement of the failure to turn promising youngsters into finished articles. His arrival is likely to be the first step in an overhaul that could cost Alan and Mark Butcher their jobs as coach and captain. Father and son, who between them have served the county for the past 36 years, have worked in tandem since 2005, but Mackay may view their departures as an essential first step to altering a sterile culture.

The recruitment policy seems to have gone awry. The trouble goes back to the successful side at the turn of the century, when senior players who had delivered trophies secured long-term contracts that made it difficult to rebuild. When Newman scored 99 in his first championship match and 183 in his third, he still found his path blocked. Steve Rixon, the Australian coach who arrived in 2004 to build a new Jerusalem, lasted all of 15 months before giving up in despair. Alan Butcher, a decent man with good intentions, filled the breach and ended up staying on, a classic Surrey solution.

Needing to win their final two matches to escape the drop, Surrey signed the overweight, scandal-ridden Shoaib Akhtar. He made little impression in his first match, his enthusiasm waning with each spell as Hampshire spent two days batting Surrey out of the match and Division One. “We have been guilty of using sticking plasters,” Sheldon admitted. “I hope our review will provide a plan for the next five years. There is no point bringing in overseas stars to get us promoted if all we are going to do is go back down. We need a carefully thought plan centring on developing Surrey players.”

Sensible talk, but it will take more than that to scotch speculation that Surrey plan to buy their way out of trouble. One of the more unlikely rumours is that Stephen Fleming and Steve Waugh are to be lured out of retirement to team up as captain and coach. “This is simply fantasy,” said one source. “Waugh would not be interested in spending several months in England and neither, probably, would Fleming.”

Alec Stewart, now agent to several England players, has also been mentioned as some sort of fireman. It is known that South Africa coach Mickey Arthur has been tapped up without success. The identity of Alan Butcher’s successor is unclear, but his fate looks sealed. Last month the chairman of cricket, Roger Harman, wrote to members apologising for the team’s performances, which he described as “not acceptable”, and decrying the lack of young talent.

Mark Butcher’s survival is also in doubt. He is 36 and has not played in the championship for three months because of injury, but wants to play on. Mark Ramprakash has a year left on his contract but proved a poor stand-in for Butcher. Ramprakash’s appetite for runs masked the shortcomings of the batting, but there is an urgent need for match-winning bowlers. Escape from Division Two may not be swift.