Farewell to Smith

After weeks of conjecture and as I wrote the other day, Greg Smith is set to join Essex on a two-year deal.

Good luck to the bloke. Only the churlish wouldn't wish him well and, at the end of the day, all of us are out to get the best deal for ourselves. Yet I maintain that Derbyshire have made the correct decision in withdrawing their contract offer in the light of the player's demands, asserting that their value of the player's worth and his own did not meet.

I read the other day that Essex have offered him £25K a year more than was on the table at Derbyshire and if that is the case, you can't blame the player for going. Yet factor in the approximate £20K a year that an essentially Kolpak Smith will cost when he plays and that is a lot of money. We could probably offer a new deal to Matt Lineker and take on a young player for not much more than that.

Speaking of Matt, yesterday's innings must have done him a lot of good and I feel he should be offered a new deal now. Only one innings, perhaps, but it was the way he batted that impressed and his form this summer has fully justified a contract. Put another way, if we don't offer him a deal, I could see our neighbours Leicestershire doing so and the player coming back to haunt us as Wayne White does every time we play them.

Onto other matters and skipper Luke Sutton has taken flak from some fans for his batting form this season, presumably from people more used to the pyrotechnics we got from James Pipe on occasion. Pipe was a fine player and he played some aggressive knocks for us, but he never captained the side at the same time. Anyone who has ever done that at any level will know how demanding it is, much more in T20 than in any other form of the game.

Sutton will probably acknowledge that he hoped for more runs, yet had few opportunities in T20 to bat for anything other than the last two or three overs. Likewise in the 40-over league, where he has only batted five times at the tail end of an innings.

Yet his wicket-keeping has remained at a very high standard throughout, something even the brilliant Bob Taylor struggled to do when he briefly skippered the side. Interestingly, in the Championship Sutton has scored 531 runs at 24. "Rubbish" cry some, yet Pipe exceeded that total only once in his time at the club. Yes, he had a higher average in his last four years, but that can come down to opportunities and not outs.

I expect Sutton, an intelligent and articulate man with business interests outside the game, to gradually move back and allow Tom Poynton greater opportunity next season. Such a move would mean another captain will need to be identified and he will need to continue the excellent team ethic that Sutton has encouraged. As for Poynton, he will have a tough act to follow, not least as a gloveman, though I am confident that he is eminently capable of doing so.

Irrespective of comments elsewhere, I maintain that Sutton has done a fine job for the club this season. As a leader he was man enough to take some of the flak from the Morris and Brown episode, something a lot of people may have been unwilling to do. His captaincy has been largely sound - all skippers get some things wrong - while his wicket-keeping has been remarkably consistent and of a high standard.

The batting? Based on the above statistics, not that bad really.