Gloucestershire v Derbyshire day 1

Gloucestershire 187 (Bancroft 58, Bracey 47, Morley 6-55, Thomson 2-20, Chappell 2-44)

Derbyshire 116-2 (Lloyd 35, Jewell 32, Came 29*, Madsen 18*)

Derbyshire trail by 71 runs

A magnificent, career-best 6-55 by Jack Morley put Derbyshire in the driving seat in the game at Bristol today. 

I don't think anyone will have seen an all-out first innings total of 187, when Bancroft and Phillips led off with a stand of 68 runs for the first wicket. Yet once Morley was introduced to the attack, the game changed. The ball turned, but not excessively and he achieved success by bowling an accurate line and length with just enough turn to find the edge of the bat, or miss it and hit the stumps..

He looked a bowler of great quality and yet again left me thinking that Lancashire backed the wrong horse when they allowed him to leave. He outbowled Tom Hartley at Old Trafford and here could hardly have bowled a better spell. 

He was well-supported by Zak Chappell, who looked to be in better rhythm than for a while and bowled well, while Alex Thomson nicked in with two wickets of his own, crucially getting the dangerous van Buuren with one that straightened nicely. The catches were held too, Ben Aitchison taking  four of varying degrees of difficulty. The one that started the rot, a diving, one-handed effort at mid-off, set the tone for an excellent, disciplined effort in the field, where only four byes were conceded as extras. Wayne Madsen also skippered the side well, setting astute, sometimes unusual fields to support his bowlers.

For Gloucestershire, Bancroft batted patiently and was perhaps unlucky to be given out caught behind, but the rest, apart from James Bracey, seemed off the pace today. Perhaps the sad morning news of the passing of David Lawrence unsettled them, but they will have been disappointed when the innings closed for just 187.

Towards the end of the home innings, Singh Dale was struck on the arm by Chappell and I fully expected him to be running in hard when the Derbyshire innings began. He did and so did Akhter, but Jewell and Lloyd accumulated well until the former drove at Akhter and was brilliantly caught at slip by Bancroft, though it wasn't picked up by the cameras. 

Lloyd and Came then took the score on, but after looking good, as he so often does, David rather gave it away and was caught at cover. He had earlier played a delightful stroke to deposit Murphy over midwicket for six and it is such a shame he cannot convert these starts into a big score.

Came, moving his feet well and Madsen saw it through to the close against the all-spin attack of van Buuren and the Australian international, Murphy. Neither, at this stage, got as much from the wicket as Morley did earlier, but one assumes they will be the danger as the match progresses.

The assertiveness of the Derbyshire response took them within 71 of the home first innings by the close. A good day with the bat tomorrow will put them firmly in the box seat and while one can never fully legislate against a collapse, I hope the current advantage can be pressed home tomorrow. It will be a very big day of cricket that could be season-defining.

In closing, a word about the stream. I was critical about Derbyshire's on Friday, but it was still still a country mile ahead of the one at Bristol today. Of course it is appreciated, but surely something more than a fixed camera at either end should be possible at this stage in streaming development?

Regardless of that, the Derbyshire return to red ball cricket could scarcely have gone better today.

Postscript: we are going away to our favourite haunt at Berwick upon Tweed tomorrow for a few days, so I won't see much of the play live. 

I will post a space for your comments each day and add anything as I feel fit from scanning through the stream at the end of it.