Posts and words Comments
Loading ...
By Emma 3 years ago, mid-July Add your comment below
Only yesterday, at Sky’s only televised County Championship match of the season, David Lloyd was to be found grumbling at the lack of positivity in modern English first-class cricket. Although the Roses match is normally a lure, I’m afraid, Bumble, you were just at the wrong game.
For most teams in the County Championship, it would be fair to say that the days of the sporting declaration have, for the most part, disappeared. This is especially so when the first 5 teams in the top division are within elbows distance of each other. The bonus system, which rewards first innings performances with bat and ball, boosts the meagre four points handed to teams who draw without an over bowled. As such, when Yorkshire were all out this morning for 320, Lancashire merely began their first innings as if there were still days to play.
Shane Warne has brough many things to the County Championship. Yet high on this list must be his forthright version of captaincy. Hampshire are not a team to draw many games, and today was no exception. In a deal that must be applauded, Warne, and Warwickshire counterpart Darren Maddy, arranged a declaration and forfeiture to set up a run chase, which was so closely contested that it took a career best 192* from Michael Carberry to secure the game in the final over for Hampshire.
Does it seem right the Warwickshire are in a worse position for playing a competitive match than either of the Roses teams are after a draw in which the only tension rested in whether Lancashire could make it to their second bowling point before they ran out of overs? Yorkshire’s former captain, Darren Lehmann, was rather vehement on the subject and but two years ago, Warne himself accused David Fulton, then captain of Kent, of handing Nottinghamshire the Championship by refusing to accept such a deal on the last day of the season.
Certainly, the Australian system is far more rewarding of results over ’score draws’, and the whole point of the extention to four day cricket was to avoid games without victors. However impressive the scorecard of Essex’s game against Nottingham these last four days, neither team showed any hunger for the win over inflated career averages and record breaking. Unfortunately for Chris Read, the two overs he bowled in a final session dedicated to over-rate improvement did not yield him his first wicket in all competitions. That, at least, might have been vaguely entertaining.
Tags: chris-read, county-championship, county-cricket, darren-lehmann, darren-maddy, hampshire, michael-carberry, shane-warne, warwickshire |
I’ve just been reading Mike Atherton’s piece on the Davidson report into what’s wrong with the English county system. (It’s on the Daily Telegraph site, Cricinfo seems not to have heard of it at all.)
Davidson wants the system whereby counties are rewarded for playing English players who aren’t going to play Test cricket again – he gives the example of Dominic Cork – with one where they are rewarded for playing (at least four) English-qualified under 25’s. Seems spot on to me.
I read that article too, and I was reading the report earlier – Atherton is right about the stiff drink, and I’ve yet to finish it as my statistics brain went dead. I am for the most part in agreement with Davidson, it must be said, because I’m sick and tired of hearing complaints about Kolpak players – there simply aren’t great amounts of them, many go on to qualify for England, and if there was a player worth their salt to take their place, they’d be there. Otherwise, they’re learning from them. It’s when a perfectly reasonable in unenforcable regulation over intention to play international cricket is flaunted – ie. Jacques Rudolph – that I get annoyed. Not that that’s particularly relevant. Anyway.
What’s interesting to note from what I’ve read is this: Davidson’s statistics perfectly cover the Fletcher regime. What is noteworthy about the Fletcher regime is that it had little to no interest in the county game. Seasoned pros were ignored for those that ‘had it in them’. Sidebottoms were ignored for Plunketts. As such, it didn’t really matter how much experience a player was getting in county cricket, or how effective it was in perfecting a player, because if they had a couple of games and Fletcher liked them, they were going to get called up.
True, Schofield does make certain assumptions – that Kolpak’s are what’re wrong with cricket – but Davidson’s flaw is mainly that it is unhappily timed with a change of regime. Ryan Sidebottom is the best example presently, but those players who are the ‘older’ debutants still have a chance now that Moores is in charge. Under Fletcher, such players were always seen as stop gaps – in Australia, Mike Hussey didn’t make his Test Debut until he was 30 years of age.
See what happens – I end up packing up a house when somethings released, miss the boat to write about it, and then end up replying in ridiculous length to your comment Innocent!. I do apologise for chewing anyone’s ears off!
Many thanks for the reply, Emma – an appropriate length as far as I’m concerned.
I think any good coach will make “touch” selections, and sometimes they’ll work (Trescothick, Prior) and sometimes they won’t (Read). After all, no one can know whether or not someone can cope with the Test arena until they play a Test match or three…
You make a good point about the change in the Australian attitude towards older players, when I were a lad an Aussie was supposedly almost past it at 30! Never seen an explanation of why they changed their tried and trusted policy…
As a Nottingham man I can only say …from where I sit,it was a good (but different ) match……when Essex finished their marathon innings……all the reporters wrote off Nottingham’s chances…..even if we followed on????
Morally we won….we certainly got the first innings points…..and we are the top of the league table …and from our previous results we deserve to be!
As for Read….he did score 240 runs…..and all you can remark on is his feeble attempts at bowling?
Of course 240 runs is great achievement, and Nottinghamshire have had a wonderful season so far in all forms of the game. But even when Read was out, with a first innings lead, they continued to bat for over an hour and a half. Division two has had several games like this – Taunton has usually been involved. To be honest, the pitch was probably most to blame for the lack of result, but out of choice, I’d rather be at the game with a manufactured close finish than the game with the wicket keeper bowling to avoid a points penalty.
This is a game played by Professionals..if they did not take advantage of the rules they could lose money.
I still hanker for the days when I used to watch my local cricket team performing (Timperley.Cheshire.) all amateurs….but still a lot of after match arguments just as now…….Was it not a manufactured close finish for Nottingham?????
« All change? | Main | 700 down, 300 to go »
The Corridor (a cricket blog) is proudly powered by WordPress
Entries (RSS) and Comments (RSS)
The Corridor (a cricket blog) All content © 2004-2010 Will Luke. All Rights Reserved.
None of the views or opinions offered on this site reflect those of my employers, Cricinfo Ltd and ESPN International
| 