**Official English County Cricket 2013**

[mightymariner]

County Champions: Notts
Relegated from Division one: Derbyshire and Worcestershire
Promoted from Division two: Leicestershire and Lancashire
Division two wooden spoon: Glamorgan
40 over Champions: Notts
T20 Champions: Yorkshire
Top runscorer in county championship(Trescothick excluded): Hildreth
Top wickettaker in county championship: Harris
Cricketer of the year: Hildreth
Young cricketer of the year: Shiv Thakor
Failure: Wayne White (if he can get much worse)
Batting at 6 in last test of the summer for England: Root
A random event that will happen: Leicestershire to win more than one match.

 

[Scaly piscine]

Bloody bottling southern toffs.

 

[theegyptian]

Yay. All kicks of tomorrow. Might even be dry for the most part. Fingers crossed. Gloucestershire to pound everyone.

 

[Pothas]

Looking forward to it. Hampshire normaly start fairly terribly so that has to change, home to Leicestershire the sort of game they have to be winning.

 

[theegyptian]

Didn't realise until today that Alfonso Thomas had agreed to not play the IPL and rather play for Somerset from the start of season. Gives them a reasonable chance at the championship.

Now with Thomas, Kirby, and Trego available they have a definite chance given their batting strength. A lot will depend on how the above 3 stay fit and will need a couple of Overtons, Meschede, Gregory, Dibble to really perform to have good success. The squad is probably too sparse around the edges but they could challenge Warwickshire and Notts.

 

[Pothas]

Hard to look past Warwickshire but I went for Middlesex in the prediction thingy, bowling looks really strong.

 

[theegyptian]

yes real quality fast bowling lineup with real depth. If it's a dry summer you worry about the spin bowling tho - and not sure the batting is quite good enough.

On a sidenote Harmison is fit for Durham but not included in the squad for tomorrow.

 

[Scaly piscine]

Not surprised, Durham have lots of seamers to choose from.

 

[Viscount Tom]

Might pop up to the ground tomorrow and watch a session or so if the weather's nice.

 

[Pup Clarke]

Now with Thomas, Kirby, and Trego available they have a definite chance given their batting strength

I seem to remember Somerset having a shocker with the bat last season (excluding Compton and Kieswetter). Think Tres was injured for a fair bit if memory serves me so might of been an aboration.

 

[Neil Pickup]

County Champions: Somerset (has to happen at some stage)
Relegated from Division One: Derbyshire and Sussex
Promoted from Division Two: Hampshire and Lancashire
Division Two Wooden Spoon: Leicestershire
Pro40 Champions: Hampshire
T20 Champions: Sussex
Top run-scorer in county championship (Trescothick excluded): Ashwell Prince
Top wicket-taker in county championship: Alan Richardson
Cricketer of the Year: Varun Chopra
Young Cricketer of the Year: Shiv Thakor
Failure: Ravi Bopara (although that's probably too obvious); Ricky Ponting
Batting at 6 in last test of the summer for England: Joe Root
A random event that will happen: Garry Ballance to make England debut

Most confident on Ballance... wonder how that will bear out...

 

[theegyptian]

I seem to remember Somerset having a shocker with the bat last season (excluding Compton and Kieswetter). Think Tres was injured for a fair bit if memory serves me so might of been an aboration.

yes the squad depth isn't great especially the batting. Barrow and Jones haven't proved themselves as yet and struggled. They;ve brought in Peterson to help with that. Rehman will play the 2nd half of the season- PCB and pot permitting so he could run through a few teams. There is no doubt they need Tres to stay fit all season.

 

[Cabinet96]

Most of Somerset's back up are kids though, so that they managed to grab 2nd last year despite the many injuries they suffered, particularly early in the season, is very encouraging for them.

I don't think they'll win the thing this year, though. They'll miss Compton during the tests, particularly any ones in May, when batting could be more difficult, and I have fears that Trescothick is getting a bit past it; last year wasn't great for him with the bat, even taking into account that his season was disrupted by injury.

Their bowling still isn't really top notch, and is a level below that of a few other counties. Although Rehman and Dockrell could form a useful duo in the latter half of the season, especially if it's a dry and hot summer (very unlikely I know!).

I'd love to be proven wrong, as I'm a Somerset fan, but I think they've missed their chance on silverware, in all forms, for a while (they really should've won something in 10 and 11, particularly). Like I said, they have a lot of promising youngsters though, so hopefully their trophy drought won't go on much longer.

 

[superkingdave]

County Champions: Warwickshire
Relegated from Division One: Derbyshire and Yorkshire(bottom)
Promoted from Division Two: Hampshire and Lancashire
Division Two Wooden Spoon: Glamorgan
Pro40 Champions: Essex
T20 Champions: Somerset
Top run-scorer in county championship : James Taylor
Top wicket-taker in county championship: Toby Roland-Jones
Cricketer of the Year: Chris Woakes
Young Cricketer of the Year: Matt Dunn
Failure: Kabir Ali
Batting at 6 in last test of the summer for England: Joe Root
A random event that will happen: Yorkshire bowled out for less than 50

 

[superkingdave]

So we've won the toss and decided to bowl - at least it puts off our first collapse of the season.

Tom Smith left out as well with Proctor opening instead and Wayne White gets his first game for the club.

 

[superkingdave]

Oh and Bedwetter keeping ahead of Buttler

 

[theegyptian]

Eddy the boy Cowan ripping it up 12* off 3

 

[flibbertyjibber]

Good to see Azeem Rafiq get the nod over Adil Rashid. One thinks young Rashid will get what he wants soon enough and a loan move elsewhere will happen. Looks like he is wasting his talent.

 

[theegyptian]

Wouldn't mind Glos picking up Rashid. Pretty short on spinners so he'd probably get a load of overs and could probably bat at 6.

 

[wpdavid]

Storming start by Hants - 0 for 2 against Leicestershire