At the end of it all, we fell short in this game, Surrey winning by four wickets with time to spare.
It didn't look that way at lunchtime, when two early wickets had them reeling, but two crucial moments probably turned this game. There was a confident call for leg before against Hasim Amla just after lunch, while a juggling attempt at a catch by Alex Hughes was grounded when he was in the twenties. Had either gone our way, the result could have been much different, as the South African did what world-class players are supposed to do in such situations and subsequently took his team to the edge of victory.
I don't blame the lad. We've all dropped chances and no one does it on purpose - it just happens. When the game is on a knife edge such things make a difference though and Hughes will no doubt appreciate that.
David Wainwright and Tom Poynton did well this morning to make the target a bigger one than seemed likely, but with every run came the feeling that perhaps the wicket wasn't quite as bad as reports had suggested. Maybe we didn't bowl as well as we could have done, maybe Surrey's middle-order had a greater collective talent than ours. I think it's a bit of everything, but the players will be disappointed tonight.
And so to Taunton. More about that tomorrow. For now, I have a family event to go to with less of a skip in my step than I hoped for, but c'est la vie. We regroup, talk it through and get ready to battle again.
The odds are looking longer now, but we have to believe we can still stay up.
Beating Somerset is a must.
It,s hard not to agree with Notoveryet,s views over the first three days,though a degree in clairvoyancy was never really going to be necessary for anyone.
ReplyDeleteFor me,this has been a game of what iff,s and if only. I don,t think there is any doubt that Surrey were there for the taking and even an average team would most likely have stuffed them. Amla played the sort of innings we all hoped Chanderpaul was going to produce. It wasn,t a perfect knock but it was a telling one and made a big difference.
The fact we came closer to winning than many of us thought we would after day one is of little consolation and it,s now going to take a miracle to keep us up. If we go into the Somerset match with this seam attack then we can forget all about winning here and now. Our batting is almost completely reliant upon Madsen,who by now must know exactly how General Custer must have felt.
The season is going to end with a whimper and the last two matches are likely to be meaningless. It,s all a far cry from this time last year and i,m by no means as optimistic about the future as some of those at the club. Without some new blood I really feel this team will stagnate as there is little genuine competition for places. It,s all been a massive anti climax.
Today's result is a shame, as it transpired the difference between the two sides was in the overseas player. For his ten thousand test match runs, 685 runs at 38 is a pretty disappointing haul for Shivnarine Chanderpaul. 1000 runs should have been a certainty, and whilst there is still time left for him to make it to that milestone, his form has been poor in recent weeks. He should have had a chance to find some form in the 2 yb40 matches last weekend.
ReplyDeleteAs for the rest of the team, Krik has something of a problem as to whether to stick with the youngsters that lost here but beat Middlesex and Sussex, or go back to some of the others. Has Wainwright done enough to displace Burgoyne on a track where we only need 1 spinner? Is Johnson a top 6 batsman?
Assuming Groenewald is back (notwithstanding the fact this is a very big assumption) I would go into the next game with a side of:
Borrington
Slater
Madsen
Shiv
Durston
Johnson
Poynton (wk)
Burgoyne/Wainwright
Groenewald
Higginbottom
Footitt
I think Higginbottom has done well in the games he has played, and dropping him now would only send out the wrong message to the younger players. I also think this season he has in fact bowled better than Palladino, as the statistics very much back up. I fail to see how a spell out injured will help Palladino recover his best form from 2012. However if my assumption about Groenewald turns out to be optimistic, he would play.
Burgoyne bowled well in the 4th innings against Middlesex, scored runs against Sussex, and did a solid job against Yorkshire, but Wainwright had a solid if unspectacular game this week. It's really a toss up between the two, but in reality I don't think either will concern opposition batsmen on anything other than raging bunsens.
Wes Durston has to come back having scored some runs in the second team, and would replace Alex Hughes who hasn't set the world alight with either bat or ball yet. His drop of Amla was crucial - though far less crucial than lack of first innings runs - but he will be a big player in future seasons.
Very good post Sam and agree with what you say and your team
ReplyDeleteI know, you know and just about everyone connected to Derbyshire cricket knows that this game which in the end was close would have been won by Derbyshire if Palladino and Groenewald had played.
ReplyDeleteWhat's more unacceptable is that both COULD have played but for 2 very different reasons didn't.
You might say accept it and move on Peakfan but that is incredibly difficult when a glorious chance to take a huge step towards safety has been well and truly blown.
In some forlorn hope that officials from the club read this blog can any right minded cricket man agree that it was right of Krikken to go into this match with only 2 proper seamers one of whom was playing only his third CC game?
I don't count Hughes as he is a slow medium dobber who Madsen couldn't trust to bowl in the second innings until the 45th over when the match was lost.
I feel sorry for Madsen captaining under such poor management and wouldn't blame him for moving on at the end of season when we go down. He must totally despair at some of the team changes he has been presented with this season.
Peakfan you will no doubt say there are things we are unaware of? Fair enough if that's the case then Krikken should use the media to keep us the supporters informed. Given this debacle that's the least we deserve.
Despite all this I will be making my way over from London to Taunton tomorrow to see the final throw of the dice. Let's hope that Groenewald gives up his nappy duties to come to the aid of his tired and beleagured colleagues and our coach does not stubbornly stick to his guns and finds room in his team for Palladino.
Not holding my breath!
One other point I forgot to mention.
ReplyDeleteHow ironic that supporters for three seasons have been questioning Palladinos absence from the one day teams yet now the only games he can get are in the very competitions he was previously deemed unavailable for.
Krikken never explained that one either
As the great John Cleese nearly said "I can take the despair after Yorkshire. It's the hope after Middlesex I can't stand". Without any claim to clairvoyance (the opposite actually - I'm a firm believer in the principle that the best predictor of the future is the past), have a look at my comment on Wednesday last week.
ReplyDeleteDon't bat first at the Oval this year, you'll get the lowest score of the match and the second innings is always the highest. Put out the strongest pace attack you can because the Oval doesn't take spin like it used to. I don't think our management did the simple research I did on how it's played this year (or indeed how it played in the Test last week), or if they had done it, they were taken in by the dryness of the pitch. As I said last night, why would the team with the weaker spin bowling prepare a wicket that was going to turn square on the last day?
Today's disappointment is all the sharper because of the expectation that had been raised by our last two games, but also by the anger I feel about the crass error that was made in the team selection.
Yes, I'm sorry, back to Palladino. Just for the history, the last time he came back from a lengthy injury (and the last time he bowled in 4 day cricket) he took 5-97 against Somerset without the benefit of any bowling practice in one-day matches. It's perfectly obvious he was fit because otherwise there would have been an extra bowler (presumably Evans if Turner and Clare really are injured) in a larger party than the 12 selected. Just to undermine any hint of clairvoyancy, I wasn't suggesting that he should replace Higginbottom, but that Poynton was probably most dispensable from the 12. I won't make that mistake again.
My point about Palladino is nothing to do with whether he was going to take wickets, more that he would have provided control, a safety net for very inexperienced bowlers so that they could relax a little, and an experienced voice in their ears when things got tough. Who was doing any of this at the Oval? Footitt is only just learning how to manage his own bowling (and it sounded as if he could have done with some support himself today). Madsen will have done what he could, but he's a batsman captain and they never really understand bowlers. Wainwright might, but playing his first match for months, it's not surprising if he's concentrating on his own struggles. The result is that there was no-one in the Derbyshire side who could put a psychological arm around their very inexperienced bowlers and help them to deliver in the mist challenging of situations.
Peakfan rightly identifies Hughes' drop of Amla as the key moment. Others missed chances, but none as straightforward as this. I could say that Hughes dropped Derbyshire into the second division when he dropped the catch, but that would be unfair. Even the best drop catches but I can't help wonder whether his concentration and confidence wasn't affected by the fact that his captain had ignored him as first change.
So for Somerset, let's learn from the history. Even if it's counter-intuitive, our two wicket keepers on current form are also our best middle order batsmen. Wainwright, near his best or not, took more wickets, bowled more economically, and batted more effectively than Burgoyne. Higginbottom didn't fail but isn't yet ready to be a new ball bowler. Hughes isn't contributing with bat or ball now, and however much it hurts, he needs time away to absorb his learning and ensure that his confidence isn't fatally damaged.
Most of all, if Krikken has been having the last word on the side, he needs to let Madsen have it. if Madsen has been having the last word, he needs to let Krikken have it. And if they've been agreeing with each other, perhaps Kevin Dean needs to be given it. At least he might understand how bowlers work.
I don,t think there is anyone who can really read a wicket, which explains why so many teams get it wrong so often. I agree with almost all of Notoveryets,s comments but not quite on the issue of batting first or second.
ReplyDeletePerhaps early season there may be a case for going second but once pitches dry up,the opposite is usually the best policy. I believe the main reason we often choose to bat second and this covers most of last season as well,is quite obviously because we don,t trust the batting. Our insistence to bat second was of no benifit at all last season and for me it was one of the main reasons we almost missed out on promotion. In the Surrey match we spent a long time occupying the crease in both innings. What we didn,t do was turn that time into more runs. Look at the number of maidens,that tells the story. The pitch might not have been the best, but no way did Surrey bowl as well as figures suggest. We started off very slowly in both innings and carried on in the same vein throughout.
Leaving Palladino out of the Surrey game was an awful error of judgement. Perhaps in mitigation,Krikken may have thought he wouldn,t be able to play back to back matches and was saving him for tomorrow,s game at Somerset. Even if that was the case, the reasoning is flawed. Had he played the Surrey game and it then transpired he wasn,t fit for Somerset,then most people would have been far more forgiving.He can,t have been injured otherwise we would have heard about it long before now.
In fairness to Krikken and "Palladino Gate" apart,he,s been hampered by an appalling injury list this season. Groenewald and Footitt the only two who have emerged unscathed. Footitt is out of contract but that may be pure coincidence,who knows. I felt at the beginning of the season we were at least one seamer short and we couldn,t rely on people staying fit,as was the case last season.Perhaps we got lulled into a false sense of security and we could get away with it again. Quite why we,ve had so many bowlers breaking down this season is unknown to me. I can,t imagine the fitness routine has changed,so is it purely down to bad luck or is it that players use these niggles as an excuse not to play?. It,s strange how winning teams in any sport are rarely troubled by an injury crisis.