Cricket Australia chairman Wally Edwards has backed James Sutherland amid speculation that the chief executive’s future is under threat.

Edwards used his address at the CA annual general meeting on Thursday to publicly support Sutherland.

Sacked national coach Mickey Arthur said Sutherland, CA’s national performance manager Pat Howard and captain Michael Clarke are all under pressure ahead of this summer’s Ashes series.

“There have been comments in recent days about James’ role in particular and how critical the Ashes series will be to his tenure,” Edwards told the AGM in Melbourne.

“I have to say that all this is as far from the truth as we could imagine.

“Our board is very strongly of the opinion that James is doing a great job and we are right behind him.

“We have an approved strategic plan that we’re extending out now to 2017 and James and the team are implementing that very, very well.”

Edwards also defended the resources that CA have devoted to the national team, following criticism by former captain Ricky Ponting.

“Over the last six years, to 2012, we in fact doubled our spend on team support and our high-performance budget,” Edwards said.

“But we’re also aware that just throwing money at the issue doesn’t solve all the problems.

“Systemic change, recommended in the Argus report … (is) also very critical to where we’re going on the field.”

But halfway through CA’s four-year plan for the national team, Edwards conceded Australia needs to lift their performance.

“You might say we’re at halftime and we’re looking forward to a pretty strong third quarter, I would hope, in the coming year,” he said.

CA announced their revenue had grown 68 per cent from 2008-12 to $684m.

They are projecting that will increase to $1.083 billion in the next four-year period.