Warwickshire CCC unofficial fans forum
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Hain brilliant again, just a shame we couldn't get him on strike more.

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Thank goodness Hain is in such form.
Questions have to be asked about Stirling. My view of overseas players is they either have to put bums on seats or improve the quality of the team. Stirling is doing neither. He should either be dropped or put lower down the order.

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We won without Stirling against Notts with that huge score. He doesn't warrant his place at the moment.

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Harsh decision against Brathwaite IMO. 5 run penalty for ball catching batsman's foot on its way to the stumps.

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Well that was poor! Derbyshire are one the weakest teams to play against.

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Whilst it was indeed a poor result, Derbyshire have not by any stretch been one of the weakest teams to play against this season! Mickey Arthur has been a great appointment for them and he has managed to get overseas players in who have not only contributed but have changed the entire dynamic of their side. Something we could certainly not say about ours….

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Unfortunately I think Stirling has changed the dynamic. His whole demeanour seems to say, ‘I don’t care’.

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Yeah Derbyshire are decent and are quietly having a good season relative to their usual lower standards.

Re. the Brathwaite 5 run penalty runs, I expect we'll be seeing it a lot more as it happens every game, I mean Stuart Broad does it every over...

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That was awful. I do not think Derbyshire are any good and their bowling looked very weak but as I have said so often over the years, we seem to lower our standards when playing sides we really should beat. Compared to Notts who we beat twice in this competition this season, Derbyshire look average. The Stirling plan is failing and it's interesting to see Will Rhodes carrying the drinks when he perhaps would be a better bet as he also bowls. Too many giving their wickets away early and if you lose 3 in the powerplay with barely 40 on the board, it always becomes difficult. Thought the umpires spent too long after the Brathwaite incident on deciding what to do. Not a necessary thing for our skipper to do but Derbyshire did try and 'milk it'.

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Sterling has to be dropped.

I said before the game same XI - obviously wasn't possible with the Briggs injury but that made it even more strange to drop Mousley when he could've replaced Briggs as the second spinner!

That Brathwaite decision was appalling. The umpire must have had it in for him for some reason.

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Harsh on Derbyshire, Paul. They've won 4 on the spin now and are 4th in the table on the back of some good form. Bears were below par today, obviously, but give the opposition credit.

Anyway, on Stirling, this is the problem if you don't sign quality overseas players, they don't perform well enough regularly enough and block opportunities for other players as they seem to be undroppable for some reason.

Any word on Briggs injury? And Hain? He looked to moving gingerly whilst batting and didn't come out to field. If we lose them for a couple of weeks we could find ourselves scapping around for the couple of wins we need for 1/4 final qualification...some tough games coming up...

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I only go on what I see when it comes to teams/players and we can beat Notts who have been the yardstick to measure most T20 sides and who have so many matchwinners in their side but from what I have seen in our 2 games v Derbyshire, they have no bowlers that would get in our team and despite winning 4 out of 4, they look like the horrible nibbly medium pacers that counties kept employing in the 1980's and 1990's and that the TCCB hated because it stopped the nurturing of fast bowling talent. Scrimshaw apart, the rest looked mediocre which makes our defeat look even more insipid. Agree about Stirling but Lancashire dropped Steve Elsworthy (Their overseas pro) for both 1996 Lord's cup finals and we are now getting to the tight stage of the competition in a close group.

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Notts have all these matchwinners but they can't seem to win any matches. Only made the 1/4's last year, so did we. I mean if they're the yardstick...yes we beat them twice, we should beat them twice but that don't mean you automatically beat Derby. It just doesn't work like that. County Cricket is competitive and the Blast is such a good comp because anyone can more or less beat anyone on any given day.

Yes I remember that with Steve Elworthy, he got dropped a few times, even got dropped for the Sunday League game against us!

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Anyone else starting to feel like Robinson has become rather scared to make big decisions regarding team selection in all formats? He’s seemingly decided some players won’t play in certain formats, which is at best lazy, at worst detrimental and poor man management.
I know T20 isn’t a format you always come off in. But we’ve got a number of players who have put in 1, maybe 2 max, performances in 10 games. Yates, Benjamin, Stirling, Davies, Brookes and Brathwaite have all been pretty average minus 1 performance. You’ve got Mousley, Burgess, OHD, Lamb and Rhodes all sat there, with the first 3 in superb form.

The same can be true of red ball, Rhodes, Yates, Davies, Brookes, McAndrew and Briggs have been poor for all but maybe 1 innings. But Benjamin, Johal, Mousley, Bethell and Hose don’t get a look in.

Seems like he’s decided who plays what format, and he won’t change his mind, and I’m not sure it’s a good thing. It also very much seems that he isn’t strong enough to drop a big name player and make a big call. So he’s essentially removed competition for places, when actually they need it to drive performance.

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Really interesting point. I'm not sure Robinson and Farbrace necessarily see eye to eye all the time. I don't think there's necessarily any cause for concern but i do wonder who or what is driving some of the ideas behind team selection. Recent recruitment has been patchy at best. Davies, McAndrew, Stirling, Brathwaite (he looks a faded force now) and further back Vihari, Malan and Holder have or had all struggled quite a bit game after game but none seems or seemed to be under pressure for his place. I just get the impression that if your a new signing you will walk straight into the team and play regardless.

There are good players who are not getting the faintest look in at all here. Particularly in the T20 format. It looks a closed shop.

I think in 4day cricket you get given time, that's fair enough (but some get given A LOT of time) but in t20 where you look at players giving you an instant impact it probably wouldn't hurt to shake it up a bit more. Other counties do it.

We seem to have a plan A but plan B seems to be do plan A but better.

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The problem with Brathwaite is that his whole career was built on hitting Stokes for 4 6's in the T20 World Cup Final. After that, some stats man pointed out that he barely got past 20 in any format for well over a year. It might be that had he not had that 1 moment, he might be playing a bit of league cricket somewhere. Not sure what his record has been since last season or where he plays his T20 games but he doesn't strike me as being that good with either bat or ball and deciding to retire himself because of his poor record against leg-spin or coming in at 7 does not tell me that he has much confidence in himself.

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Unfortunately our two weakest players should be our strongest..our overseas players.

Selection is really costing us at moment. Its about time we dropped Stirling and Daviss. Would like to see Lamb and Burgess given a go for Wednesday and Friday

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Those 2 would make the side a lot stronger and cannot really see why Burgess isn't in anyway and Stirling's lack of runs means Lamb should be given a go.