Bits 'n' bobs

Had a call from my Dad this evening, ever so slightly concerned.

"How can Hinds play for us this summer when he's playing for the West Indies against England".

The worry was palpable but I was quickly able to calm him and let him know that it was not Wavell of this parish but Barbadian Ryan.

Good job too, as Wavell has been on fire for Jamaica in recent weeks, averaging 62 for them in four day cricket, while not playing in the shorter forms of the game. Three fifties in seven innings but a highest of 75... realistically we need The Wave to be going on to the big scores this season. Similarly Buck has continued his fine form for Victoria and Charl continues to bowl beautifully in South Africa, so all of our overseas players seem in decent fettle.

The other news is that Derbyshire are following last year's pre-season tour to the Caribbean with another to the ever-so-slightly less tropical Isle of Wight. You can read all about it by clicking the Cricket World link on the left

Hopefully they get decent weather and a chance to turn their arm over and swing the willow.

A little discussion on 606 with regard to Derbyshire's "mediocrity" for the approaching season. I'd disagree and think we have some very good players. What will make or break the year will be the contributions of the lesser lights, some of whom have to step up to the plate for us to do well. In Langeveldt, Rogers, Hinds, Wagg, Pipe and Clare we have good players, but six out of eleven leaves you exposed. On their day Smith, Redfern, Stubbings and Borrington are players of talent, but they need to move forward this year, while Tom Lungley has to stay fit or could struggle to get another deal. Jake Needham is another who can cement a place in the side and there are others (Garry Park, John Sadler, Dom Telo) who can play but simply have to show they can do so consistently.

With six players of class, the likelihood is that only half at best will fire in each game. If we can find from the many on the staff one more batsman who can approach 1,000 runs, we'll not be far away from winning division two in the Championship. We cannot leave it all to the skipper, however and we must also get at least 800 from Hinds. To be honest, I'd expect a thousand this time for him to be worth a Kolpak place, as there's plenty on the staff who'd get 750 runs given the opportunity.

Only a couple of months to go. To quote my daughter, not that many years ago, "how many sleeps is that"?