We want Daniel Sams according to the Daily Fail.

I don't know why. Unless we're moving on from Garton.

Garton’s bowling role seemingly stagnating, depicted by the frequency with which he bowls PP overs only, Sams probably covers the death overs more efficiently and comes with an obvious bigger reputation. Would take this as meaning no Hassan Ali next season though, and that’s a gap in our Blast attack for sure. Left arm variation plus better hitter than Hass is a nice upside?

Not having Garton or Hassan Ali would not be a negative, their availability was dreadful, and in most games the performance was less than adequate.

We have wasted too much money on Hassan Ali for the low number of games played and poor performance levels.

Hass was terrific in the Blast last year to be fair.

Thought Woakes would have been filling that role?

Sams definitely a death bowler, which we have lacked. If Sams comes id imagine we'd be moving on from Garton eventually as we wouldn't carry a no.7 bat who bowls 1 maybe 2 overs. Would feel like a luxury we can't be having. Unless he's seen as somebody who could bat 6 and be a bit of a sixth bowler.

Could be anticipating reduced availability from Gleeson again?

On the plus side, Sams is a strong player and I'm not going to criticise the club for showing ambition.
On the minus side, I'd have to ask (again) how much we can expect from a mercenary who is probably going to bowl no more than about 40 overs for us before disappearing never to return. Would he even be contracted for the knock-out stages or would he be off to another franchise tournament? We've recruited rather a lot of seam bowlers to the permanent squad now and I might think that we would be better advised to spend management and coaching time - not to mention money - on them.
If he's being targetted as part of a considered strategy, fine. If it's just a case of "here's a player, let's have him" then, no.

Just remembered, Jordan Thompson will be in that Hassan Ali role.

Highveld wrote:

Not having Garton or Hassan Ali would not be a negative, their availability was dreadful, and in most games the performance was less than adequate.

We have wasted too much money on Hassan Ali for the low number of games played and poor performance levels.

This is such an odd take, Hassan took 25 wickets (far and away our highest) at an average of 15 last season!

Exiled Bear wrote:

Highveld wrote:

Not having Garton or Hassan Ali would not be a negative, their availability was dreadful, and in most games the performance was less than adequate.

We have wasted too much money on Hassan Ali for the low number of games played and poor performance levels.

This is such an odd take, Hassan took 25 wickets (far and away our highest) at an average of 15 last season!

You should know by now that once Highveld decides he doesn't like a particular player he reminds us about it constantly 🙄

Hassan's been very good for us, has played multi-format and has always looked like he's putting in full effort, no problems there. Just that there's always so much inconsistency with his injuries and the Pakistan CB. That's the only part.

In any case, I get a bit weary of the talk of "mercenaries". It's too strong a term, we're not talking about hired killers here. The Global game requires these short-term, contract-based players now all T20 competitions are played in some sort of block. We probably have had a few too many who haven't worked out, but I don't think that is a critique of the concept. Getting an OP who can stay longish term and play multi-format is more of a bonus than a minimum requirement now.

I don't mind finding another word for it but I still think it is valid to question whether a short-term import with no real "investment" in the club is as effective as one might like to think. If we can get a galactico like Maxwell or McCullum then I get it, but Sams? Good, yes but stellar, no.

Certainly fair to question who we appoint on these contracts. Even the Galacticos might fail a cost-benefit analysis. I think Maxwell and McCullum both got one great innings mixed up with smaller contributions but don't fault the ambition of shooting for it. I guess the art of doing it is being late enough but still early enough to secure someone who matches our weaker spots. I guess Sams is good for left armer duties but it seems like we will have lots of all-rounders in the team by then.

UrsaMinor wrote:

I don't mind finding another word for it but I still think it is valid to question whether a short-term import with no real "investment" in the club is as effective as one might like to think. If we can get a galactico like Maxwell or McCullum then I get it, but Sams? Good, yes but stellar, no.