The long-term future of Sussex skipper Chris Adams is in the balance after he refused to sign a new contract.

How has it come to this?

Chris Adams, the man who led Sussex to the greatest achievement in their 165-year history, will report for pre-season training with Sussex in a month's time wondering whether his seventh season with the county might also be his last.

The county have offered Adams a two-year extension to his contract which runs out at the end of the season.

He is happy with the financial terms on offer, but wants the security of a three-year deal.

There have been two sets of negotiation but still there is stalemate. As it stands, Adams will be open to offers from other counties in October.

For those supporters attracted to the county by the success they have enjoyed under him, a Sussex side without Adams would be unthinkable, but that is now a real possibility.

Sussex have so far refused to say why they will not give Adams what he wants.

Money it would seem, is not an issue, so we can only assume that they are worried about the prospect of diminshing returns from a player who will turn 34 a month into the new season.

If Adams has a poor summer then the club's cautious approach will prove to be the correct one.

But am I the only person who thinks the current impasse might actually inspire him?

Adams' body is showing signs of wear and tear which is hardly surprising after 16 years in the county game and nearly 550 games for Derbyshire and then Sussex.

He had a knee operation in 2003 and struggled with a sore elbow for the second part of last season.

Despite that, he has missed just ten Championship games in six years at Hove, an enviable fitness record.

And no current cricketer, at Hove or elsewhere on the circuit, is more driven.

There is not a trace of irony in his voice when Adams, his enthusiasm for both captaincy and batting reinvigorated by last year's success, talks about playing until he is 40.

He has scored 14,750 first-class runs, 37 hundreds and 70 half-centuries. By the time he retires he wants 20,000 runs, 50 centuries and 100 fifties to his name.

This will be the first season in a decade or more when Adams will not give serious thought to playing for England.

He has achieved another of his ambitions by playing Test cricket for his country, but that was five years ago and, if he is honest with himself, he must accept that his international career is over. At least it is another potential distraction out of the way.

Adams is not universally popular among Sussex supporters, despite delivering the biggest domestic prize of all in 2003 and three trophies in all during his captaincy, as many as the county had won in the previous 36 years before he led them to a one-day title in 1999.

Some of the greybeards in the Hove deckchairs still resent the fact that he earns so much. Others question his captaincy skills.

He is no Mike Brearley, but rival captains all agree that they know they are in for a battle the moment Adams throws the coin in the air.

Most importantly, the people who matter the most - the ten players who follow him onto the field every day - would run through brick walls for him, such is the sense of togetherness he has fostered in the dressing room along with coach Peter Moores.

After Mushtaq Ahmed, it was probably the biggest single factor in bringing the Championship to Eaton Road for the first time.

I even suspect there are enough admirers among the local business community who would be prepared to help pay Adams' wages for an extra season if push came to shove.

It works both ways of course, but I can't think of any Sussex captain of recent times who has put himself out more for the county's sponsors.

If it can be done to fund a second overseas player then why not for Adams?

Let's hope it does not come to that. Adams and his family have had three moves since coming south but he is finally settled in the Sussex countryside north of Haywards Heath and has no wish to up-root his wife Sam and two young children again.

But the next contract he signs will probably be his last.

Like any professional sportsman in a similar position he wants some long-term security and if Sussex cannot provide it you can be sure even now that there would be other counties willing to do so, Surrey and Hampshire among them.

Adams must cast envious glances in the direction of Taunton where Andy Caddick, two years his senior and with doubts still remaining about his long-term fitness, is about to sign a four-year contract which will reward Caddick's loyalty to Somerset if nothing else.

The ideal scenario would be a run-laden year for Adams and another trophy at the end of it. With the strongest squad since he became captain at his disposal, you could make a good case for Sussex successfully defending the Championship in 2004.

My hunch is that a year from now Adams will still be a Sussex player. Let's hope so, because his departure would leave a void the county would struggle to fill.