In the old days of newspaper publishing, it was said that the editors of the Derby Evening Telegraph kept a piece of text in permanent typeface, reading "The going was slow at the County Ground today".
Those were the days of attritional cricket, the 'no fours before lunch' of Roses match legend. Yet if I were to fast forward to the computer age and leave my laptop on from day to day, I could equally easily - at least so far this season - copy and paste from blog piece to blog piece something along the lines of "the Derbyshire batsmen struggled to come to terms with the conditions".
Yet during the afternoon we looked to be doing rather well. At 113-2 we were even looking at the promised land of a decent first innings score. Godleman and Hughes set off at a fair lick, yet both perished by the sword as they had lived by it. Chesney has some time on his side after his Headingley heroics, but Godleman will be all too aware of the form being shown by Ben Slater and will realise that nice twenties are of no real consequence at this level.
Indeed, I'm more forgiving of a player who gets out early, before eyes, hands and feet are as one, than someone who gets out at that stage, when often only something special from a bowler or over ambition from a batsman should be the issue on a decent track.
Thus Chanderpaul cannot escape criticism on this occasion. I am sure that he had big plans for his 300th first-class innings but reports suggest he never really settled today. No one will be more aware than him that more is needed for someone in the overseas role that is of paramount importance to a young side. It was most unlike him to give it away to a tame catch to the only man in front of square on the off side. I just hope that the weight of expectation isn't weighing too heavily on his shoulders, though years in the West Indies side should have helped him with that one.
Top marks again to Wayne Madsen, who showed once more that he is a very fine player. Indeed, a lesser one might have struggled to touch the lifter that got him near the end of the day and the quick loss of debutant Ally Evans gave the scorecard a look that was not especially good for Derbyshire eyes.
We missed the injured Wes Durston today, but as I've said before, let's judge this effort when it finishes and when Sussex have batted. There's always something in the track at Derby and with four seamers selected we have a chance of success, especially when Messrs Footitt and Evans have points to prove.
Big day tomorrow. I'd love to see Ross Whiteley get some runs and there's enough batting in the lower order to get us up to 250.
Where it goes from there, time will tell.
It,s not a great total by any means though we still have some hope of adding a few more today. It,s all shaping up as another example of how we keep pressing our own self destruct button just at the time when the innings as a whole should be starting to flourish. Madsen has proved recently that batting is not such a difficult task but most of the others still look hopelessly out of touch. We could still haul ourselves back into contention but my sensible head tells me that Sussex will not the same sort of mistakes that are haunting our season.
ReplyDeleteI was out of the area yesterday, but it seems very strange that Notts had a full days play at Trent Bridge and we only manage 55 overs. I,ll stand being corrected but Nottingham tends to get almost identical weather to Derby, so what was different yesterday?.
I noticed that too Marc, re the weather issues at Derby and Nottingham. Is our pitch really that poor?. And Peakfan, spot on about Chanderpaul. He should be leading the way in this side, but he's flopping badly at present. He needs a big score and the runs will flow I'd like to think. Another big day today, how often have we said that already this season, and we're only in May.
ReplyDeleteSo far as the weather is concerned, it had stopped raining by the time I arrived at half 11. There were various inspections which declared parts near the square to be "squishy" and that they needed time to dry out. Play started at 2.30pm. As usual in these situations there seemed to be a startling lack of urgency on the part of all concerned and it seemed to me play could have started far earlier than it did.
ReplyDeleteSpireite Tim
Ross whitely suddenly turning on the form wasnt never going to happen, i watched him yesterday in the warm-ups with batting coach houghton and he still wasnt hitting the ball in the middle of the bat and dave was only throwing the ball at him. its worth giving young slater and alex hughes a blast instead of keep thinking the likes of whitely, borrington, godleman will suddenly come good.
ReplyDeletePaul.
Another poor day with some shockingly expensive bowling. As a whole unit, we're a million miles off where we want to be. Nearly relegated in May is still a possibility.
ReplyDelete