And so it arrives. Derbyshire's last Vitality Blast fixture of the summer, which is likely to double as the last at the helm for John Wright and Dominic Cork.
Both men can leave with heads held high, and if they didn't manage to deliver the hoped for finals day appearance, they gave us more credibility than we have had in the format. More on that with my review at the weekend.
Tomorrow we face Durham at The Riverside, already qualified for a home quarter final and doubtless wanting to cement their place with a confidence-boosting win. We travel with the same fourteen again and unless we come up against an unexpected dry and turning track, my guess is we go with the same side that did well against Leicestershire before the rain came down.
The forecast is pretty good, which will be particularly good news for Henry Nicholls, who otherwise could have been here for the most expensive fielding stint in recent history. It's a shame that we weren't able to see the full extent of his talent the other night, but no doubt he will be keen to impress, with Tom Latham in the opposition, as will Lockie Ferguson.
Despite the signings of Alex Lees and Axar Patel, neither make the squad as they are ineligible. So Durham also go with an unchanged 14, namely:
Tom Latham (c), Graham Clark, Paul Collingwood, Liam Trevaskis, Ryan Davies, Stuart Poynter (wk), Ryan Pringle, Will Smith, James Weighell, Barry McCarthy, Nathan Rimmington, Mark Wood, Chris Rushworth, Ben Whitehead
It will be a battle of the seam attacks and the result will come down to which batting side performs the best. Ours has flattered to deceive this summer and early wickets have too often derailed an innings.
I hope that we can give John and Dominic the send-off that they deserve, but Durham have done well with fine, all-round cricket.
I suspect that will see them edge proceedings tomorrow, but I hope that I am wrong.
More from me then.
Will Dominic be there Peakfan? He was on Sky Sports last week watching Lancashire when we were playing Northants?! Seemed an odd situation. Maybe he was scouting
ReplyDeleteHe was at Derby on Saturday against Leics. I don't think the Lancs match he commentated on was on the same night as ours against Northants. I've seen a few comments suggesting that Cork had disappeared and speculating that he had gone with Barnett, but the evidence suggest otherwise.
ReplyDeleteHe was on sky when we played Northants..
DeleteDurham's success in the group has been probably the surprise of the Blast this year, particularly bearing in mind how awful they were a couple of months ago in the one day cup. Tahir has obviously been a big difference for them, but Latham has been a huge plus for them as well. It's interesting to note that of the counties at about our level who have or are likely to qualify - Durham, Worcs, Gloucs, Glamorgan and Kent - most have had a linchpin overseas batsman. I think this is one thing that Wright and Cork got wrong, as well as Ferguson and Riaz have done. You can't possibly argue that any of these have a bowling attack that anywhere equals ours, and yet they've achieved more. Of course it's not as simple as that, and other factors such as team selection, pitch preparation, and unity and understanding of each member's role in the team have played a part, but this is one simple thing we got wrong, particularly after we knew that Reece would miss the competition.
ReplyDeleteI've not been greatly impressed so far with Sharif, so I'd be inclined to go with just the 5 bowlers, Rampaul, Ferguson, Viljoen, Hughes and Critchley, and play the extra batsman in Dal or Slater. I've been very much impressed by Dal who deserves the opportunity to play an innings, although it defies belief that ben Slater can't find a place where he can prosper in t20, and this would be an opportunity to start to build something for next year.
To my knowledge he hasn't been seen since Kim left.......but as usual no news from the club
ReplyDelete