DURHAM cricket chiefs hope to bring more Test matches to Chester-le-Street despite lower than expected crowds for England and West Indies.

The £45m-worth of planned improvements to the Riverside, which will take permanent seating up to 20,000, are being done to maintain the ground's grade A status for hosting top fixtures.

The match, which England won, suffered from rain, which claimed a whole day's play.

Durham chief executive David Harker said: "As a Test venue you want to stage Test matches. The bottom line is given the choice of no Test or a Test against Zimbabwe or West Indies, we want West Indies."

The next international at the Riverside will be a one-day game between England and Australia on Sunday September 20.

Mr Harker believes that the club's staging of that event, which has enjoyed strong ticket sales, will boost its profile as a Test venue.

"It was pretty much sold out before Christmas, there might be a handful of tickets left for that game, but there's been no problem in selling that," he said.

"The ECB (England and Wales Cricket Board) recognises that the right sort of event we can sell, such as the Australia game."

The club spent almost £3m last winter to increase seating so that it can stage big events.

ECB chief executive David Collier said he thought Durham had been extremely unfortunate.

"I feel for Durham in that they have not had the luck of the weather, " he said. "I think that is always the danger for the English summer. It can happen at the end of the season or in the middle of the season.

"I think they have done well in terms of the development of the ground. Clearly they could build an audience here for games.

"I think they have picked up a much better game than they would have had had it been Zimbabwe (who were England's scheduled opponents for the week's match before they were expelled from Test cricket last year)."

Durham bid £500,000 to secure the match and the county has to recoup the bulk of that money through ticket sales - an adult ticket cost at least £30.

Glamorgan, backed by the Welsh Assembly, paid £3m for the right to stage the opening Ashes Test against Australia in early July.

"We have to bid high because if we don't, we'll end up with nothing and we can't afford to miss out on a game when we're spending millions developing the ground, " said Durham chief executive David Harker.

"We set the prices for this game to sustain a bid of half a million quid. We've got to get that money back from somewhere."