Lancashire 292-8 (Petersen 115, Palladino 3-70) v Derbyshire
At the end of what appears to have been an excellent day's cricket, Derbyshire's skipper Wayne Madsen felt that Lancashire had been allowed off the hook.
The game is still even, but from 55-4, the red rose county will be delighted by the application shown by their lower order, led by one of their Kolpak recruits, Alviro Petersen. He is a good player, as he has shown in previous county stints and showed all of his experience in battling through tricky pre-lunch conditions.
At that point one sensed we were a wicket away from breaking through, but the experienced South African showed that runs could be scored with sufficient application. Derbyshire bowled with discipline, led by Tony Palladino's three wickets, while two each for Mark Footitt and debutant Shiv Thakor showed that there was something in the wicket for seamers.
By the same token, wickets largely fell around the two new balls and batting became easier thereafter. We are very much in this game and we will not know the significance of this score until we have batted ourselves. A solid opening stand would help us considerably.
All in all it was a good effort in the field against a side that most critics suggest will bounce back to the top tier this summer. The only surprise, for me, was that it took until the 50th over and a century stand had been compiled before Alex Hughes turned his arm over. He has established a reputation as a wicket-taking bowler and I thought he may have bowled before that, especially when Petersen and Smith had handled everyone else with increasing authority.
A worthy effort then. Let's hope that our own efforts with the bat are equally stoic and tomorrow night I am reporting on an impressive batting display.
The end of the day looked less rosy than lunchtime.We had them on the ropes and rather failed to land the killer punch. Just how damaging the Lancashire recovery will be to our own ambitions remains to be seen. By tonight we will be in a better position to judge.
ReplyDeleteI don,t normally comment on dropped catches because,as we all know,they happen. Unfortunately,missing Petersen twice was something we could have done without. Neither were the easiest but as yesterday proved,they can sometimes be very costly.
I too thought Madsen handled his bowlers poorly yesterday. I don,t wish to make a mountain out of a molehill but one long standing criticism of the skipper is a lack of rotation within the bowling ranks. In the case of Hughes,this has happened previously,when he has either been ignored completely or used very spasmodically. If Madsen doesn,t trust him then the question arises of why we are actually playing him.
I must confess to having my own doubts about Hughes, following a mediocre 2014,but during pre season he has taken his share of wickets and surely deserved more than the seven overs he was allocated yesterday,not to mention the belated timing of his spell.
I don,t wish to sound too negative as at the moment we are still very much in the game. The test will be how we perform ourselves with the bat. The obvious danger now is we surrender a sizeable first innings lead,which would place our opponents firmly in command of the match. Hopefully,my concern will prove unfounded but at the back of my mind I have a few niggling doubts about this match.
Oh dear, Guptill out for a duck and the reply not started well.
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