Cork back for T20!

The return of Dominic Cork as specialist T20 coach is welcome news for Derbyshire supporters this morning.

And indeed playing staff. 

The success of the 2019 summer will live in the minds of county supporters and while the team failed to perform at Finals Day, there were some special displays on the way there. That the success came without major overseas input spoke volumes, and made fans wonder what they might do with a couple of quality specialists from overseas. 

We didn't find out last year. With few overseas players, injuries to key bowlers and a batting line up that simultaneously lost form, Cork was battling against the tide in 2020. The top four of Godleman, Reece, Madsen and du Plooy carried all before them the previous summer, so much so that few others had a chance to impress with the bat. Last year they struggled, for reasons that weren't immediately obvious.

The lack of real preparation didn't help, but opponents strangled the top of the innings with spin, Billy Godleman finding this especially challenging. Starts were too slow and when Leus du Plooy got in he was either left with too little time or with three down inside the Powerplay. Maybe the awareness that the bowling was struggling didn't help either, the absence of Ravi Rampaul keenly felt, while the fielding, so good the year before, was at times hapless (Durham away a prime example.)

Perhaps an indicator for this year came at the end, when Tom Wood played a fine knock at Headingley. Were I Dominic Cork, the role for skipper Godleman may be better served lower down, when the steamers largely bowl at the death and a man who has gorged on them for years is around to handle them. Certainly the thought of Ben McDermott and Tom Wood at the top is mouth-watering, while consideration may be given to Madsen, one of the best players of spin in the country, joining the Aussies to tackle the Powerplay, with du Plooy at three.

I am a big believer in your best batsmen having the most time in which to bat and with Reece, Wood, Hughes, Critchley and Godleman to follow, runs should not be an issue this year. 

Cork, like all county supporters, will hope for one more seam bowler from overseas, to share duties with the improving Dustin Melton. Hopefully  Sean Abbott, who is not only a fine bowler in all formats but also a hard-hitting bat. He averaged 94 in the Sheffield Shield this winter, as well as taking 16 wickets at just eighteen runs each. 

If Dave Houghton can deliver that final piece of the jigsaw, reasons to be cheerful could be amended to 'ecstatic'. Michael Cohen and Ben Aitchison could also be potent components of a keen bowling attack. 

Welcome back to Derbyshire, Dominic. 

None of us can wait. 

Book Review: Bill Bestwick, Rough Diamond by Mick Pope

Bill Bestwick is a Derbyshire cricket legend and deservedly so. Emerging from the coalfields at Heanor he was for a long time the club's greatest wicket-taker, only since surpassed by Les Jackson and Cliff Gladwin.

To be fair to the great post-war duo, they were able to help each other and, in Derek Morgan and Edwin Smith had fine bowlers to help dismantle the opposition batting. With the exception of a few years when he bowled opposite Arnold Warren, Bestwick WAS the Derbyshire attack. He bowled unchanged for hour after hour, keeping up a remarkable hostility when ordinary men would have tired.

He was used to hard work down the pit, of course, where he returned each winter. The hard work forged broad shoulders, great strength, strong legs and a willingness to bowl, which he generally did without complaint from April to September. 

For a captain he was a dream, though he didn't always turn up and sometimes, when he did, alcohol had done him no favours. Because Bill liked a drink, undoubtedly a little too much, and it was his achilles heel. As Arnold Warren's one impressive Test appearance was never repeated after over-zealous celebration, so Bill's chances of Test selection when the country had few better bowlers were wrecked by being simply too unreliable around alcohol.

Mick Pope's outstanding book is a 'warts and all' look at a player who appeared too often in front of the magistrates and in newspapers for the wrong reasons. Plenty would tell you he was a lovely, generous man much of the time, but he was an aggressive drunk who could be his own worst enemy. As long-time club secretary, Will Taylor put it 'he was a very pleasant individual but gave us, through his thirst, some very difficult moments.'

It is all in here. The rise to county stardom from nowhere, the loss of his wife, then the fight (one of many) that led to a charge of manslaughter. His sackings by Derbyshire and a Lancashire League club, a move to Wales and then his re-emergence in one of the county's darkest hours to take 147 wickets in 1921 at the age of 46. Forty-six.. 

He bowled over 900 overs that summer, at an age when most are long - retired. Those who saw him in action are long gone, but a short run up and those strong shoulders saw him surprisingly quick with a devastating break back and one that cut away sharply. He was a very ordinary fielder and no batsman has recorded more ducks for the county, but Bill Bestwick could certainly bowl. 

It is far from a conventional cricket biography, but then Bill Bestwick was far from a conventional man, one who polarised opinion and yet was a key member of his county side for almost a quarter century. 

He was one of three Derbyshire players not yet fully documented in print whose life and career was always worthy of exploration. I had considered doing it, but I don't think anyone could have brought him to life as well, or as thoroughly, as Mick Pope has here. 

He isn't a Derbyshire man, as he notes in the book, but that doesn't matter. He considered dropping the project after the direct family line descendants didn't want to be involved, but for cricket history and literature it is a good job that he didn't. 

I have read hundreds, maybe thousands of cricket books, but not many of them twice. I can pay no greater tribute to the author than that I will be starting this again, soon. 

It is that good. If you are a fan of cricket, social history, a character who is both hero and villain and a lover of a damn good read, this is the book for you. 

Well done Mick. You played a blinder. 

Bill Bestwick: Rough Diamond is written by Mick Pope and published by ACS Publications as part of their Lives in Cricket series. 

It is priced £16 and can be ordered herelink

Shahzad becomes new bowling coach

There was many a time in my 54 years of supporting Derbyshire that I would scratch my head at a signing, or the recruitment of a coach who didn't seem the best fit. Indeed there have been many summers in the time I have written this blog where things didn't seem right and attempting to explain the goings on needed considered use of words.

I have to say that in recent years my writing has become easier, because we get most things right, on and off the field. In particular, the appointment of Dave Houghton as Head of Cricket has lent a gravitas and common sense approach that has not always been the county's way of working.

Thus the appointment of Ajmal Shahzad as bowling coach, following in the footsteps of his fellow county man Steve Kirby, makes eminent sense. 

As a player he was good enough to play for  England. Just the once, but a Test bowling average of under 16 is pretty good on a CV. At county level his career was truncated by injury, but he was a lively, skilled bowler of fast medium who gave good service to Yorkshire, Lancashire, Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and Sussex. He played in all formats and so will be well aware of the lengths to bowl in them, together with the skill sets required to be successful. Equally he will know the mental and physical challenges of county cricket, ideal for a coach who has a young attack to work with.

After finishing his career at the too-young age of 31, he became coach at Ampleforth, before becoming Head Coach at the MCC.

Steve Kirby held that position too and did a sterling job when he moved back north. Kirbs made a big impression on everyone with his cheery disposition, as well as being a coach of considerable ability. 

His move to Somerset has seen Ajmal follow him once more  and I am sure all of us hope he can get the best out of an exciting crop of young bowlers. As he said on his 'welcome' video this afternoon, there is variety to the attack, with right and left-armers,  tall and smaller ones. Each offering different challenges to batsmen and good options for Billy Godleman. 

There is a nice air of positivity in the Derbyshire camp as we get to within sixty days of a new season. The batting should take care of itself, but if the young bowlers have learned from their short 2020 and a winter in the nets, 2021 could be memorable, for all the right reasons.

Just need our other overseas recruit signed up now and we will be good to go. 

Welcome to Derbyshire, Ajmal. 

We all wish you well.