Sorry about the lack of blog last night and its just a short note from me this morning.
We can win this game, with a squad that is rightly unchanged. There was little wrong with the performance or personnel at Bristol, aside from a manic last four overs that cost us the game. As I wrote then, credit the opposition for the courage of their convictions, but the wheels came off and we would have won that game 99 in a hundred times.
It was good to see Wayne Madsen admit team culpability over the last ball error, because it was. Someone should have been 'switched on' enough to notice that we had too many fielders on the leg side; if two umpires can spot it, eleven players should be able to. 'Commitment, attention to detail and professionalism' was, as several people pointed out yesterday, what I noted as crucial - and exactly where we fell down. A very good side can fall down in some areas and still win, but a developing one needs to get most things right, or will struggle. Just as we saw, really.
Our visitors have won the two T20 games between the sides so Derbyshire will be wanting to get onto the win column between the sides.
There's enough in the tank to win this one.
I’m about to set off to Derby on a sunny afternoon and doubt whether I’ve ever done so with such a sense of gloom, even taking into account the bad days of the 1970’s and 2000’s when the best you hoped for was a fighting display even in the heaviest defeats. The best I can hope for today is to come away this evening thinking “at least they didn’t f*** that one up” and suspect that most of the others who go will feel no better than that. We can only hope that none of the sense of despondency and fear that supporters feel is shared within the team, otherwise the good performances will start to evaporate as well as the wins.
ReplyDeleteI’m disappointed to see that there is still no place for Palladino in the team. He’s been playing in the seconds as well as against Australia so we know he isn’t injured or being rested for 4 day matches, and we can also assume that he hasn’t done anything that has put him beyond the pale as Wayne White seems to have done. In these circumstances, the cricketing case for him playing is irresistible, not just because of his track record in this competition, but also because of the nous and maturity he brings to the bowling unit. With Mark Footitt short of his best, we are putting a lot of pressure in very young bowlers to keep it going for 10 overs, and asking for the sort of problem we had at Bristol.
I’m also concerned about the captaincy issue. Durston hasn’t particularly impressed me with his T20 captaincy, and I was surprised by both his appointment and the timing of it. If Madsen wanted to give it up, why was that decision not made before the competition began rather than two games in, which must be disruptive for the team? And why Durston rather than Godleman, when I think the approach that RLODC needs is closed to 4 day than T20 cricket? I agree that all 11 players on the field were responsible for not noticing the leg side field issue, but there were other decisions that helped to set up the debacle. Durston doesn’t seem to have taken account of the risk of further rain interruptions which the commentators were anticipating and keeping something back from the quicker bowlers. I was also interested to note a comment by Michael Klinger that the reason for only having 4 overs after the delay when there was time for 12 or 13 before the cut-off time was that Derbyshire would have been penalised for a slow over-rate if there had been more than 4 overs. I’m not clear how the playing regulations would have created this, but if it’s correct, we could have had more overs and not had the problem of people being bowled out. And of course the decision to use Critchley and Hughes that others have commented on.
At the very least today, I hope that the lesson about asking very inexperienced leg spinners to learn how to bowl in pressure situations while they are actually in the pressure cooker will have been learned. It might also be worth remembering that David Willey collared Critchley very firmly in the 4 day match at Derby (though to be fair, only after Critchley had dropped him off his own bowling before he got going. Even more, I hope I’m not going to be commenting on yet another way of Derbyshire throwing away a winning position.
Think it is safe to say that most of your fears have been allayed, notoveryet!
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