There's an oft-told story from the world of rock music of Van Halen demanding to have a bowl of M&Ms backstage during a gig, but with absolutely no brown ones. So the story goes, they once turned up at a venue, found brown M&Ms and did thousands of dollars worth of damage.

Like all good stories, this has a basis in fact. Van Halen did indeed specify in their contracts that they should have a bowl of M&Ms with absolutely no brown ones, but this wasn't because of any extravagant rock-star demands, but as a test. For the contracts also contained clauses covering the electrics of the venue, the ability for the venue to support the stage and many more technical clauses. So their thinking went, if the venue wasn't following this part of the contract to the letter, then perhaps other, more serious, aspects weren't being followed either.

This thinking tended to be correct. The band would find brown M&Ms and sure enough, there'd be an issue with the venues wiring or some other issues. The thousands of dollars of damage that happened when the band found a brown M&M wasn't caused by the band but by the venue not following the requirements to support the weight of the stage, causing the stage to sink through the floor.

What then, does this have to do with ICC TV?

Well when ICC TV first started live streaming pathway events one of the first things I noticed was a simple error. The bowling figures were consistently displayed as runs/wickets as opposed to the usual standard of wickets/runs. Never mind, I thought, a simple error easily corrected.

But tournament after tournament came and went without this being fixed. Nor were any other errors being fixed. Not the shaky cameras, not the dodgy frame rate, not the random crashes in the app, not the frequent "we'll be right back" messages that could sometime last half the game.

The displaying of bowling figures the wrong way round wasn't a simple error that would be fixed. It was the brown M&M when none were wanted. A sign of wider issues to come. A sign of a lack of care. Quite simply, the ICC TV service is not fit for purpose, and there is no evidence of any attempt to improve it.

Contrast this with the streams of county cricket. When they started they were simple affairs - single camera streams with BBC radio commentary played over the top of them. Since then they have continuously strived to improve, to the point where the best ones are now virtually indistinguishable from standard TV broadcasts.

To give credit where credit is due, not everything about the ICC streams is poor. The commentary is often exceptional, with several experts from the world of associate cricket contributing. But these commentators are hamstrung by a poor standard webstream that sometimes cuts them off.

The initial contract for the live streaming of pathway events expired before the World Cup Qualifier. That the ICC have extended the deal for these intital pathway events of the next cycle is yet more evidence of a lack of care and attention to what are nominally high profile events.

When the global qualifier for the T20 World Cup was scrapped, the ICC said that it would mean that the regional finals would be given a higher profile. Not only have they scheduled two of them during the Ashes, they're showing them on a third rate app with a third rate production where most things are being done on the cheap.

The ICC aren't giving the regional finals a higher profile, they're hiding them away as if they're ashamed of them. The players deserve better and the fans deserve better.