After the first day of the game at Worcester, you could safely say that Derbyshire are going to have to work hard to get a positive result from this game, as the hosts won a very good toss and proceeded to make 376-3 by the close of play.
I'm assuming that's a pretty good batting track and what is sauce for the goose should be for the gander. You could perhaps have put money on Phil Jaques emerging from his poor run of form against us, but at this stage I'll content myself with the thought that we might have to make a last afternoon run chase to take the win points from this match.
To be fair, unless you replaced one of the seamers with Graham Wagg, you would probably say that this was our strongest possible attack, which suggests that it is a belter of a batting track (as Worcester historically has been) or that our attack isn't the best. While I don't think the current line up is a vintage Derbyshire attack, it is also a long way from being the worst in my experience. I'm inclined to think that this will be a high scoring game and just hope that our batting responds in an appropriate manner tomorrow and Wednesday.
The Worcestershire attack was decimated in the winter, as players left New Road as if it had revolving doors. One would assume that there should be few terrors for our batsmen and a few people, like Jaques, could take the opportunity to play themselves into form.
We'll see.
I certainly would not regard Lungley in the best attack we can produce, but a Wagg swap with him would most likely form that unit, so I go along with your thoughts there.
ReplyDeleteHughes certainly deserves his place in the XI with Sadler dropping out.
It will be a tough game to turn around, so some good application is required by our batsmen, as one Mr Geoffrey would say. It is certainly an opportune time for the chaps to prove that the last CC2 game was truly just a one off nightmare.
On a positive note (and I know you like positive Peakfan), I still reckon we have the ability to make the top two, but we are too reliant on a small core of players to produce the telling performance. On the flip side - and I apologise now for appearing premature and negative here, I can already envisage what the discard list ma well be come September. Some names will, dare I say it, match those I raised at the end of last term. But hey, let's keep positive here. We have no one to fear in CC2 if we play anywhere near our potential.
MASTERVILLAIN