A squad of 13, but Yates is not there - presumably a return to the 2nds tomorrow, to sort himself out.
McAndrew back, but Hain, Briggs and Norwell are out injured, so it will be a very interesting team selection. Dan M in as front line spinner?!
_"You can take the boy out of Atherstone, but you can never take Atherstone out of the boy !"
"The Bears and the (footballing) Foxes for ever !" _
Hain, Briggs, Norwell, Stone, Woakes, Sidebottom - that's half a team, all of whom (except Sidebottom) would get in on merit if fit.
I hope that some of the injuries (Hain and Briggs in particular) are relatively minor and maybe an indication that the club is prioritising having them fit for the final T20 group matches. I wouldn't normally want T20 put ahead of red ball cricket but I guess the Blast is the Club's best hope of success this season.
Live scores link
https://live.nvplay.com/ecb/#m9e28600f-9cd8-4e65-8ac9-88dd339250b8
Great to see Jacob Bethell getting a chance in the championship team.
Surely Norwell isn't injured again?? Chris Woakes doesn't look like returning anytime soon as we head into July in a few days.....
Northants are 13/1...
Bald_Reynard wrote:
A squad of 13, but Yates is not there - presumably a return to the 2nds tomorrow, to sort himself out.
McAndrew back, but Hain, Briggs and Norwell are out injured, so it will be a very interesting team selection. Dan M in as front line spinner?!
Bethell is in - our only spinner (unless you count Lamb and Sibley):-
Davies, Sibley, Bethell, Rhodes, Lamb, Benjamin, Burgess, McAndrew, Henry Brookes, Miles & OHD.
_"You can take the boy out of Atherstone, but you can never take Atherstone out of the boy !"
"The Bears and the (footballing) Foxes for ever !" _
Bowling not performing again, and runs leaking at quite a rate again.
I said it a couple of games ago but in the games we play the opposition score so much faster than we do.
Unless we take regular wickets, the scoring rate will get out of hand and we could be facing another big score against this lot again and that means perhaps only a draw is the best we can get. Keogh averages just over 30 and Cobb just over 28 and we are making them look like world beaters.
That's the most significant comment I think. First choice bowling attack all injured. I'm not sure quite how badly Hain and Briggs are but if they need a game to recuperate dor it would be this one.
GerryShedd wrote:
Hain, Briggs, Norwell, Stone, Woakes, Sidebottom - that's half a team, all of whom (except Sidebottom) would get in on merit if fit.
I hope that some of the injuries (Hain and Briggs in particular) are relatively minor and maybe an indication that the club is prioritising having them fit for the final T20 group matches. I wouldn't normally want T20 put ahead of red ball cricket but I guess the Blast is the Club's best hope of success this season.
Whilst that is true, Stone and Woakes have pretty much not be available for red ball for a few seasons with their England commitments, so we kind of have to assume they won't be available.
That means the only one really missing of the quicks is Norwell, and it seems when he's missing we really struggle - he has that little bit of extra zip and is more consistent.
The big thing for me is the lack of consistency with the seam attack. Too many bad balls - wide, short or both - and a good over is often followed by a bad one. Something isn't working with the seamers, be that ability, coaching or plans.
I still don't think that OHD, Miles, Brookes and McAndrew is a bad seam attack but so far this season they have proved to be.
I’m not sure today was as bad as people are intimating.
If the stumps had been removed from the lush green strip, it would have been impossible to pick out today’s track; the wind blowing from the pavilion end was ridiculously strong all day; the incredibly fast outfield was like glass, and was also very uneven; the track was as flat as a freshly laid M6.
Let’s wait until both teams have batted and PS Craig Miles took the catch of the century!
I think we need to remember that they batted first for a reason.
Could the bowling have been cheaper and more controlled? Definitely. But at the same time, it’s a very flat pitch, fast outfield and I think everyone is very much aware of the limitations of the bowling attack this season. OHD has been excellent but often unsupported. Miles hasn’t been the same red ball bowler this year and Brookes is inexperienced.
And McAndrew is up there as the worst overseas in many years, which is saying something because the club has had some shockers under Farbrace.
Not the best day at Northants. With all these changes, particularly to the batting, why wasn't Adam Hose given a chance? The guy is in phenomenal form, albeit in the white ball format. His confidence must be Sky high.
Hose has not shown any form over the last 2-3 seasons in red ball games, that may change, but selecting Benjamin and Bethell ahead of him is the right decision, both have made big scores in 2nd team games this season.
Ideally both Bethell and Benjamin get good cores to ensure at least on of them stays in the first team for the rest of the season.
I feel players should be picked if they are in form. Burgess should be batting in the T20 team - he can't do any worse than Stirling!
I have been at work all day so haven't had a chance to watch any of it so far but has there bowling been so accurate that we are struggling to score at such a rate or is it about self-preservation at the moment. No real complaints seeing as we have no wickets down.
While I approve of being cautious when batting, particularly early in the innings, when we score this slowly it does mean the bowling side are never out of the game. All it takes is a wicket or two and they’re right back on top again
Yes and it means that the opposition can keep attacking fields without that much fear of going for loads of runs and the game getting away from them.
We deserved to win the Championship last year no doubt, but cricket is moving forward all the time, as evidenced by our test team. Somehow we need to take the shackles off and particularly in our batting become more assertive. It seems a lot of our opponents this season have comfortably scored at over 3.5 an over against us, but I can't recall us doing the same often.
Similarly, I can't recall the last time we got maximum batting bonus points.
Absolutely! 400 in 110 overs at 3.6 should be achievable regularly.