Dog of a ball weren't it. Floodlights taking affect now...

We are going to accept soon that WCCC needs some leadership. Davies has been, and will continue to be a disaster and the appointment of Westwood was a desperately weak decision showing little research, less inspiration and no ambition. Much like the previously mentioned captain.

Davies should resign after this shambles of a performance. If he doesn't resign then Westwood needs to wield the axe and replace him with Barnard. Should we lose this match and at Essex next week, we'll be looking over our shoulder at relegation.

For goodness sake Highveld I wish you would shut up. No one said they were the best opening partnership, what was said (I can’t remember by whom) was that looking at the stats over a certain period they stacked up amongst their rivals reasonably well.

This was at a time where you were, as usual, constantly making comments. The sort of comments you make at every opportunity.

The people on this forum know enough about cricket to know what they see. It is not about being able to say ‘I told you so’.

A lot of people were not convinced about Davies and have been concerned by Yates’ inconsistency however you seem to delight in their struggles and relish the opportunity to put the boot in and let everyone here know just how smart you are.

Tedious.

Apologies for the rant…..I blame the country’s ‘best opening partnership’ for my frustration.

Devon_Bear wrote:

Davies should resign after this shambles of a performance. If he doesn't resign then Westwood needs to wield the axe and replace him with Barnard. Should we lose this match and at Essex next week, we'll be looking over our shoulder at relegation.

Agreed. Would like to see Davies take the gloves and bat down at 6. Think it would be best for the team and Davies. Although Smith has certainly shown enough in first innings that he has something

In fairness to Yates how much does taking a break mid season affect your form? The T20 block with Latham opening effectively retired Yates for a few weeks. Batting right down the order in a 20 over innings is no way to keep the form required of an opener. Herein lies the problem of playing cricket in blocks.
I am not going to join in the criticism of Davies I'll leave that to those who see the game from the ground rather than a laptop.

Do these runs count towards people's season averages? I don't know anymore...

Davies at 6 makes sense

Let's not forget that Davies was one of the leading run scorers in the country last year. I've seen him play some daft shots but I've also seen some mature innings. I guess it's a mental thing that probably isn't helped by him being captain. Perhaps Westwood could sell a change of captaincy to Davies on the grounds of it being good for his batting.

Not a terrible gloveman either.

In cricketing terms, it probably is, hence my caveat that people can judge it how they like, but I do like the link to statistical analysis - a bit nerdy on this as is part of my job. Do agree with Highveldt that baseball takes it to the next level while the current Bazball age (in the UK) does seem to reduce the emphasis on data and replacing it with 'vibes' which is far more fun to discuss.

Andy wrote:

This business of taking batters averages but removing the highest and/or lowest scores, then revising the average and then judging the player accordingly is pretty mad, no?!

UrsaMinor wrote:

Let's not forget that Davies was one of the leading run scorers in the country last year. I've seen him play some daft shots but I've also seen some mature innings. I guess it's a mental thing that probably isn't helped by him being captain. Perhaps Westwood could sell a change of captaincy to Davies on the grounds of it being good for his batting.

Good point, I agree. Of course, the affect of the extra responsibility on their form is usually the main reason players lose (or give up) the Captaincy. If Davies won't volunteer to go, we have to hope Westwood tells him (and it's accepted!), 'cos it sure needs doing.

Tayls79 wrote:

In cricketing terms, it probably is, hence my caveat that people can judge it how they like, but I do like the link to statistical analysis - a bit nerdy on this as is part of my job. Do agree with Highveldt that baseball takes it to the next level while the current Bazball age (in the UK) does seem to reduce the emphasis on data and replacing it with 'vibes' which is far more fun to discuss.

I find the blithe arrogance of the England setup where they feel their taps nose, I know what I am seeing intuitive genius overrides statistics to be grating and highly annoying.

Fingers crossed the guys get stuck in today. Going to give it an hour before deciding whether to head down for a few hours.

Were we not told when Davies was signed that due to multiple injuries his hand no longer allowed him to keep in four day games?

Dan Mousley has chucked a ton away there.

Big win for Essex, they are just behind us in the table now. And we play them next match!

Hampshire & Yorkshire looking like draws, we desperately don't want to lose to the bottom club today.

As i speak we lose a wicket! Webster in now, he'll probably think we can still win the game from here.

We can't really complain about the morning. Only 1 wicket lost and I just don't want to lose to our neighbours especially reading some of the tosh they were coming up with on the BBC cricket site last night. I want a 'No Wickets' day, it's happening in the Test, we need it here as well.

Whisper it quietly but there is probably more chance of winning than drawing.

We should never have put ourselves in this position but certainly well batted today!

Class innings from Malik, hopefully gives him the confidence to carry on for rest of the season