Cricket

[GS250]

May I just mention the comment by Jimmy about the precedent having been set the day before when it comes to bad light...that, and you'll be aware if you've ever decided to use your body rather than the bat (as in missed !) that a ball even travelling at well below Test level delivery...hurts !

Yes...we all know that ball hurts like hell when you take one on the body. I think its half the reason a lot of kids give up on cricket once they start having to use a proper ball! Yes, things changed somewhat when Phillip Hughes was tragically killed a few years ago. However, lights and a pink ball have proven to be a safe combination. In the event, last night's fiasco didn't affect the outcome.

As for the radical change in England's performance, maybe something called leadership has emerged c/o a certain Kiwi along with players being actively encouraged to play their own game, rather than some restricted coaching version and something called " a positive mental attitude " has resulted. Silverwood was hardly a shrinking violet when he was playing, and Root's performances need no clarification...I get the impression the demise in England's performances was just a bit more complex than attributing blame to two very consummate professionals.

No one can doubt the dedication and professionalism of Root or Silverwood. However, like many England captains before him...he wasn't a natural leader of men and was also pretty risk averse. He was there by default really until Stokes started to show some signs that he was captain material. Root's captaincy wasn't a disaster, but you always felt we could be doing better. Silverwood on the other hand failed badly in his role in my opinion. As I've alluded to, the whole 'rotation' policy not only undermined England's ability to win test matches, but also showed a huge disrespect towards our opponents. Most of whom proved they were not 'lesser' at all. Again, it wasn't something of which was exclusive to Silverwood, but our obsession with winning the Ashes ruled above all and it also meant key series were just written off time and time again.

Onwards and upwards though!

 

[Bald Rick]

Root's captaincy wasn't a disaster

No, he only won more test matches than any other England captain …

 

[GS250]

No, he only won more test matches than any other England captain …

Some interesting and balanced views on the last 20 years or so of England captains.

https://wisden.com/stories/englands-test-captains-of-the-21st-century

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

County Championship...Division One

Lancashire (1st innings)...... 131 all out
Essex (1st innings)............. 107 all out
Lancashire (2nd innings)..... 73 all out
Essex (2nd innings)............ 59 all out

Lancashire win by 39 runs.

40 wickets fell in just over a day's play. What sort of gremlins were in this particular Chelmsford track?

 

[Old Yard Dog]

Ollie Pope and Ben Foakes are playing for Surrey against Yorkshire this week, but the Tykes are denied the services of Joe Root. This is grossly unfair and typical of the ECB's anti-Yorkshire bias.

We have provided England's sides with Joe, Jonny Bairstow, Adil Rashid, David Malan, David Willey and Harry Brook this season and all the thanks we get is the ECB rigging the County Championship so Surrey win the league and Yorkshire go down. It stinks.

 

[DarloRich]

Ollie Pope and Ben Foakes are playing for Surrey against Yorkshire this week, but the Tykes are denied the services of Joe Root. This is grossly unfair and typical of the ECB's anti-Yorkshire bias.

We have provided England's sides with Joe, Jonny Bairstow, Adil Rashid, David Malan, David Willey and Harry Brook this season and all the thanks we get is the ECB rigging the County Championship so Surrey win the league and Yorkshire go down. It stinks.

Try being a Durham fan and then tell me about the ECB!

 

[SteveM70]

Try being a Durham fan and then tell me about the ECB!

Or indeed a fan of any county that doesn’t host test matches. The whole system stinks

 

[Lost property]

Ollie Pope and Ben Foakes are playing for Surrey against Yorkshire this week, but the Tykes are denied the services of Joe Root. This is grossly unfair and typical of the ECB's anti-Yorkshire bias.

We have provided England's sides with Joe, Jonny Bairstow, Adil Rashid, David Malan, David Willey and Harry Brook this season and all the thanks we get is the ECB rigging the County Championship so Surrey win the league and Yorkshire go down. It stinks.

E.W Swanton, unlamented former cricket correspondent of the Telegraph, once wrote " as I make the annual pilgrimage North from Lords "...but a Mr R. Illingworth put it, as he was prone to do, more bluntly "maybe the selectors need to go a bit further North than St Johns Wood "....both of whose comments tell us all we need to know...oh, and the one from the Kent chairman about why Kent would always supply the England keeper deserves a mention as well. Jonny's late father (bless him) was a very accomplished keeper and Captain although it would be fair to say he wasn't, unlike his son, the most elegant of batsman.

However, as lifelong dedicated L.C.C.C supporter who has access to Valhalla and who has watched Y.C.C.C move rapidly to 20 without loss.... before lunch, I offer my commiserations at the frustration felt by Minor Counties with aspirations

 

[jfollows]

ECB review led by Andrew Strauss reported at https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cricket/62985372 proposes

Under the proposals:

• The start of the County Championship would move from April to May and run continuously throughout the summer months - rather than being split between the start and end of the summer as it is currently - and finish in September, with teams playing a minimum of 10 games.
• There would be two second division conferences of six teams, with one promotion place decided by an end-of-season play-off.
• The One-Day Cup would take place in a single block in April and could include minor counties in an FA Cup-style knockout format.
• The T20 Blast would reduce from 14 matches to 10 and would also be in a single block from the end of May to end of July.
• The Hundred would be the only white-ball competition to take place in August, with 'first-class cricket festivals' offering specialist red-ball players not competing in that competition the chance to play extra matches.

Any changes to the domestic structure have to be agreed by two-thirds of the 18 first-class counties. The ECB hopes to have a final decision by November with a view of implementing the changes in time for the 2024 season.

Personally I'd ba happy to do away with The Hundred but I think that it's actually been good for womens' cricket and for new young audiences, so I don't think this is going to happen in the new future!

 

[roversfan2001]

I'm quite happy with the proposal and will be voting for it when Lancs put it out to the membership. I appreciate that most people who are bothered enough to vote won't be best pleased with it though.

 

[SurreyCommuter]

Ollie Pope and Ben Foakes are playing for Surrey against Yorkshire this week, but the Tykes are denied the services of Joe Root. This is grossly unfair and typical of the ECB's anti-Yorkshire bias.

We have provided England's sides with Joe, Jonny Bairstow, Adil Rashid, David Malan, David Willey and Harry Brook this season and all the thanks we get is the ECB rigging the County Championship so Surrey win the league and Yorkshire go down. It stinks.

Makes up for the T20 Blast QF when you were allowed to pick David Willey but we weren't allowed to pick anyone in the England squad at the time. Also we had 20+ players contracted to the hundred meaning our RLC team resembled a youth/academy team even though a number of our players didn't see any action in the hundred!

Seriously though the rules as to who can/cannot play and when need to be applied fairly to all counties!

 

[Bald Rick]

Surrey … County Champions!!

 

[Busaholic]

Ollie Pope and Ben Foakes are playing for Surrey against Yorkshire this week, but the Tykes are denied the services of Joe Root. This is grossly unfair and typical of the ECB's anti-Yorkshire bias.

We have provided England's sides with Joe, Jonny Bairstow, Adil Rashid, David Malan, David Willey and Harry Brook this season and all the thanks we get is the ECB rigging the County Championship so Surrey win the league and Yorkshire go down. It stinks.

Didn't Rashid and Willey, for two, decide they weren't prepared to sign up for championship cricket? Brook, following his belated introduction to Test cricket, is now contributing well to the England T 20 side in Pakistan. Bairstow is injured, otherwise would have been in Pakistan anyway. Perhaps Yorkshire should have won last week when they had the chance!

Surrey … County Champions!!

I gave up supporting Surrey at an early age, in the 1950s, as it was getting so boring them being county champions year after year! It was by far the nearest county ground to my home in S.E. London too. Instead I decided to support Kent and was present on a dull Autumn day when they won the Championship in 1970 at the Oval.

 

[tigerroar]

No comment on the mankad from yesterdays womens match? I know it's a long running contentious issue but seeing that example yesterday where the bowler has almost completed her action only to stop and run her out was a desperate act and wholly unsporting.

I'm of the mind that if the batter is out of her crease for the run up then first the bowler should warn her then if it happens again it's fair game that they remove the bails as they're running past but the way that was done yesterday was shameful. To be mid action and stop is just embarrassing.

 

[Puffing Devil]

I'm of the mind that if the batter is out of her crease for the run up then first the bowler should warn her then if it happens again it's fair game that they remove the bails as they're running past but the way that was done yesterday was shameful. To be mid action and stop is just embarrassing.

Completely agree. Cricket relies on good sporting behaviour between both teams which goes beyond the rules - an over-riding spirit of fair play.

Perhaps time to give that call to the umpire - with the player seen to be taking an advantage given a warning, then penalty runs?

I'm quite happy with the proposal and will be voting for it when Lancs put it out to the membership. I appreciate that most people who are bothered enough to vote won't be best pleased with it though.

I'm very unhappy with the proposal and don't see any benefit to improving test or white ball cricket. The ECB have dug themselves into a hole with the 100. There was no need for that competition, other than greed. No other country plays, or will play, the format, so no benefit to our international standing.

Scrap the 100, return the T20 to the summer months, use the marketing spin to drive attendance, not that it was poor, and allow Counties outside of the franchises to participate. Swathes of the country cannot attend a live 100 game as there is no franchise near them - north of Leeds, South-West of England.

Freeing the players from that circus with yield all the playing days we need to continue with a vibrant red and white ball programme.

 

[SteveM70]

Completely agree. Cricket relies on good sporting behaviour between both teams which goes beyond the rules - an over-riding spirit of fair play.

Perhaps time to give that call to the umpire - with the player seen to be taking an advantage given a warning, then penalty runs?



I'm very unhappy with the proposal and don't see any benefit to improving test or white ball cricket. The ECB have dug themselves into a hole with the 100. There was no need for that competition, other than greed. No other country plays, or will play, the format, so no benefit to our international standing.

Scrap the 100, return the T20 to the summer months, use the marketing spin to drive attendance, not that it was poor, and allow Counties outside of the franchises to participate. Swathes of the country cannot attend a live 100 game as there is no franchise near them - north of Leeds, South-West of England.

Freeing the players from that circus with yield all the playing days we need to continue with a vibrant red and white ball programme.

Yes. Exactly this. But of course it won’t happen unfortunately.

Part of me thinks part of the ECB’s longer term strategy is to hope that three or four of the smaller counties go bust

 

[Busaholic]

No comment on the mankad from yesterdays womens match? I know it's a long running contentious issue but seeing that example yesterday where the bowler has almost completed her action only to stop and run her out was a desperate act and wholly unsporting.

I'm of the mind that if the batter is out of her crease for the run up then first the bowler should warn her then if it happens again it's fair game that they remove the bails as they're running past but the way that was done yesterday was shameful. To be mid action and stop is just embarrassing.

Having seen the incident both in real time and slow motion, the batter was way down the pitch before the bowler had reached her bowling mark, so it wasn't unfair imo. It was also obvious that it wasn't a premeditated action and I think the bowler was well within her rights. It was also obvious from the reaction of the batters immediately afterwards that, though naturally upset, they accepted it with good grace and shook hands quite happily with the Indian players who certainly weren't gloating.

 

[tigerroar]

Having seen the incident both in real time and slow motion, the batter was way down the pitch before the bowler had reached her bowling mark

You need to take another look then. The bowler was well into her action and the bat was still grounded in the crease.

 

[Busaholic]

You need to take another look then. The bowler was well into her action and the bat was still grounded in the crease.

She was an extremely slow bowler in her action - the batter was virtually out of the picture from the side-on footage of breaking the stump. Say it had been England with one run to win: short of claiming the striker's wicket, the fielding side would have no chance of a run out because of the batting side taking unfair advantage. I suspect if the boot was on the other foot, so to speak, and England had done it then the general response wouldn't been so critical. The fact it's referred to as a 'Mankad' is interesting too: it could equally be called a 'Greig.'

 

[tigerroar]

Has a mankad eve been used in first class cricket in this country?

And the bat was still grounded in the crease mid action.

 

[Busaholic]

Has a mankad eve been used in first class cricket in this country?

And the bat was still grounded in the crease mid action

Two totally different reactions from England captains.

Mike Atherton (to non-strikers) - 'simple, stay in your crease'

Michael Vaughan - 'it stinks.'

Have to say I used to value both men's views on Test cricket, but everything Vaughan now says is tainted with bitterness and a refusal to acknowledge his past involved many unsavoury incidents, some of which are undeniable as he made the comments on social media. Atherton remains peerless imo.

 

[SteveM70]

Two totally different reactions from England captains.

Mike Atherton (to non-strikers) - 'simple, stay in your crease'

Michael Vaughan - 'it stinks.'

Have to say I used to value both men's views on Test cricket, but everything Vaughan now says is tainted with bitterness and a refusal to acknowledge his past involved many unsavoury incidents, some of which are undeniable as he made the comments on social media. Atherton remains peerless imo.

Exactly

Two points of view

The laws of cricket say it’s ok

The spirit of cricket says it’s not

 

[Winthorpe]

Exactly

Two points of view

The laws of cricket say it’s ok

The spirit of cricket says it’s not

Well put. I tend towards the latter view, but I can see the other side.

Apart from the debate on the law/spirit of the 'Mankad', I was surprised such a controversial dismissal was contemplated at that stage of the game. Its use is usually born out of desperation, but England were nine wickets down with 17 more runs needed from 39 balls. And India had already won the series.

 

[Busaholic]

Exactly

Two points of view

The laws of cricket say it’s ok

The spirit of cricket says it’s not

I disagree with your last line. Now, if you said the spirit of cricket was not being followed when, after a wicket, the bowler had his/her foot placing checked by technology for a no-ball and the evidence was scrutinised for minutes as it was possibly a fraction of a millimetre over, then a 'not out' was given, I'd agree. It's ridiculous nonsense, and just proves cricket is a batter's game. Incidentally, Atherton has written very eloquently on the Spirit of Cricket, and obviously feels this incident didn't breach it, which I agree with. Vaughan's views on the Spirit of Cricket I'm not interested in, as he's clearly not placed to pontificate.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

County Championship...Division One
Day 1 of 4 saw Lancashire score freely against the Surrey bowling and at the close of play, they had reached 414-5.
Jennings 190 not out
Croft 86
Balderson 53 not out

 

[HST43257]

In the relegation battle (Yorkshire, Warwickshire and Kent)

Yorkshire (80-3) vs Gloucestershire (190 all out)
Warwickshire (138-2) vs Hampshire (Yet to Bat)
Kent (Yet to Bat) vs Somerset (195-9)

Yorks and Kent both need to at least draw (with a couple of bonus points) to be safe, therefore sending Warwickshire to Division 2. Good to see Yorkshire’s full bowling attack back, with Matt Fisher taking 4 in a good 5 over spell.

Meanwhile, in the promotion battle (Nottinghamshire, Middlesex and Glamorgan)

Nottinghamshire (276-2) vs Durham (Yet to Bat)
Sussex (Yet to Bat) vs Glamorgan (221-3)
Worcestershire (167-8) vs Middlesex (Yet to Bat)

Nottinghamshire are more or less up already, so it’s between Middlesex and Glamorgan to take that final spot.

In some ways, little is learnt in terms of who is likely to go down or up, since all 6 teams concerned have had pretty decent first days. However, the likes of Warwickshire and Glamorgan ought to get a move on if they want to force a result, since they need wins to have a chance of staying up/promotion.

 

[roversfan2001]

County Championship...Division One
Day 1 of 4 saw Lancashire score freely against the Surrey bowling and at the close of play, they had reached 414-5.
Jennings 190 not out
Croft 86
Balderson 53 not out

This being more runs than were scored across all 4 innings in the last game.

 

[Busaholic]

In the relegation battle (Yorkshire, Warwickshire and Kent)

Yorkshire (80-3) vs Gloucestershire (190 all out)
Warwickshire (138-2) vs Hampshire (Yet to Bat)
Kent (Yet to Bat) vs Somerset (195-9)

Yorks and Kent both need to at least draw (with a couple of bonus points) to be safe, therefore sending Warwickshire to Division 2. Good to see Yorkshire’s full bowling attack back, with Matt Fisher taking 4 in a good 5 over spell.

Meanwhile, in the promotion battle (Nottinghamshire, Middlesex and Glamorgan)

Nottinghamshire (276-2) vs Durham (Yet to Bat)
Sussex (Yet to Bat) vs Glamorgan (221-3)
Worcestershire (167-8) vs Middlesex (Yet to Bat)

Nottinghamshire are more or less up already, so it’s between Middlesex and Glamorgan to take that final spot.

In some ways, little is learnt in terms of who is likely to go down or up, since all 6 teams concerned have had pretty decent first days. However, the likes of Warwickshire and Glamorgan ought to get a move on if they want to force a result, since they need wins to have a chance of staying up/promotion.

With Kent achieving maximum batting and bowling points, Warwickshire can't overhaul them now. They'll be praying for Gloucestershire to bowl Yorkshire out cheaply for a second time.

It was 'Stevo' day at Canterbury today in honour of Darren Stevens, the 46 year old who Kent aren't retaining despite his batting average this year of 125.00 in the Royal London One Day Cup, and the lowest number of runs leaked from his overs too. He may get a player/coach job somewhere (possibly Leiecestershire?) and, if so, it may not quite be the end of his playing career yet.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Day 2 saw Lancashire eventually all out for 512, with Jennings out for 199.

Surrey ended the day on 123-5 in their first innings.

Day 3 saw Surrey lose their last 5 wickets moving on to 209 all out and Lancashire imposed the follow-on.

Surrey in their second innings were all out for 173. Managed to lose 15 wickets on day 3.

Lancashire win by an innings and 130 runs.

I'm very unhappy with the proposal and don't see any benefit to improving test or white ball cricket. The ECB have dug themselves into a hole with the 100. There was no need for that competition, other than greed. No other country plays, or will play, the format, so no benefit to our international standing.

Scrap the 100, return the T20 to the summer months, use the marketing spin to drive attendance, not that it was poor, and allow Counties outside of the franchises to participate. Swathes of the country cannot attend a live 100 game as there is no franchise near them - north of Leeds, South-West of England.

Freeing the players from that circus with yield all the playing days we need to continue with a vibrant red and white ball programme.

I wonder what the total membership is of all the County Championship sides? They are the ones who pay their membership fees and it is they who should hold a ballot in which they can express their views on the matter in question.

 

[Winthorpe]

I wonder what the total membership is of all the County Championship sides?

The decline in membership is depressing, I'm afraid:


Source: https://twitter.com/lancscccaction/status/1561750043211829251?s=20&t=Frf2knwliRasLexS2989BQ

Membership at all clubs has declined except at well-run Surrey, which has doubled its membership (its membership offer is excellent).