Unless Derbyshire come out tomorrow like men inspired, or alternatively it hoses down all day, we should lose this match sometime before lunch.
There was plenty of laudable fight from the middle order, but at 21-3 we were looking down a barrel with three experienced men gone. Hughes, Smith, Whiteley, Clare and skipper Luke Sutton fought hard, but it was not enough and even my optimism cannot see anything other than early and heavy defeat tomorrow.
Then it is time to regroup before the televised CB40 this week (ironic as the game doesn't really matter) and the next Championship match.
There's plenty to occupy the thoughts of Karl Krikken after this one.
Greg Smith, our most valuable player, was top scorer again. I would sooner keep Greg than spend nearly two hundred grand a year on Collingwood.
ReplyDeleteAs for the rest of the season, with us having nothing to play for then I think we should have a look at Poynton and Borrington and maybee Lineker, Needham and Burgoyne.
One poor game and it looks as though we have to ditch half the team. On this basis, we'd have needed 40 players on the staff last year.
ReplyDeleteInteresting that anon above singled out Smith as the exception in a poor performance today. The Radio London commentators were calling him a "walking wicket" before lunch. In the over he got out, he'd charged down the wicket three times at Smith, and had already narrowly avoided being stumped and caught. At 90-3, you have to question his brains more than his ability.
One interesting point from the commentary yesterday was that neither Newman and Malan have reached 50 this season before yesterday, and a quick look at the averages show that both were averaging below any of our batsmen apart from Guptill.
Apart from showing that quality players are worth persevering with through bad patches, the other point that occurs to me is how often players suddenly return to form against us, or how often players with modest records achieve career bests against us. It might be an illusion, or it might be bad luck, but it does make me wonder about how much we know about the teams we play against. So, for example, had anyone done some research on Malan and why a previously capable player had struggled this year?
The economics, capacity and timescale of cricket (and Derbyshire in particular) may not allow the kind of scouting that is common in football, but it would be interesting to know if Groenewald, Clare and Palladino had any more information about the current weaknesses of Newman and Malan than their previous knowledge.
I fail to understand how anyone can rate Smith as anything but an average player, Look at his stats,they don,t lie and everyone should bear in mind we are talking over several seasons,not just this year. He is not worth retaining,it,s as simple as that.
ReplyDeleteHe's leaving - check out my article on Falcons Forum.
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