***Official*** English Domestic Season 2008

[Richard]

Indeed, but perhaps he just doesn't churn out the performances for the 2nd XI.

Well, Second XIs. He's played for three counties.

I think I'll have a look though. It's a worthwhile question.

 

[Manee]

I was thinking of writing Second XIs, but thought that your responce would be worth it...

And hey presto, it was.

 

[stumpski]

Interesting ... Yorkshire 98-9 at the Rose Bowl, with Tomlinson and Tahir four wickets apiece. Has anyone seen Tomlinson this season? He's taken 51 wickets now, more than doubling his career tally despite having debuted back in 2002. Could be a late developer, perhaps.

 

[Richard]

Was averaging 30 or the best part of for the most of it. Just a couple of sensational games, a 10-for and a 9-for (possibly to be turned into another 10-for) here.

Don't know what we're playing at in this second-innings, woeful stuff.

 

[Richard]

And just to cap it off, the last 2 wickets are gifted to David Balcombe, who must be about the worst bowler to play for Hampshire since the 1930s.

 

[Spitfires_Fan]

The same way that last September, 33 wickets fell over 1 and a half days in the Lancashire v Durham match without anything being done about it

http://content-uk.cricinfo.com/countycricket2007/engine/match/268111.html

Two wrongs don't make a right though? Anyway, looks like batting was easier in that game, given that a 50 was scored in each innings of the match.

 

[Perm]

Pretty good knock by Stephen Moore, 124* and at a pretty quick rate. How come we haven't heard more about him as a potential English batsman? Seems fairly capable.

 

[Richard]

He's a fair nobody, Moore - as well as being another from the Pietersen\Trott camp of SAfrican nationalised-Brits.

Worcs aren't the most fashionable of counties, Moore has generally been a quiet achiever in the First-Class game and not someone who often bats in the top-order (both he and fellow-opener Mitchell bizarrely tend to get sent in at five, six and seven in OD cricket), never mind scores many runs, in the one-day games (which are the televised ones). These are two contributory factors.

He's also never before this year had a really stellar year, averaged 39 in 2004, 34 in 2006 and 37 in 2007. Had a pretty decent year in 2005, averaging 48, but generally it takes a year averaging in the 50s or 60s to get you mentioned for the step-up, and this is the first year he's managed that.

He was also a relatively late starter - he's 27 now, nearly 28, and I guess he could hope for an England A tour this winter. If so, it'd be the first time he'd have played First-Class cricket for someone other than Worcestershire, and in a career now spanning 5 years, that's very unusual.

 

[Langeveldt]

He's a fair nobody, Moore - as well as being another from the Pietersen\Trott camp of SAfrican nationalised-Brits.

Worcs aren't the most fashionable of counties, Moore has generally been a quiet achiever in the First-Class game and not someone who often bats in the top-order (both he and fellow-opener Mitchell bizarrely tend to get sent in at five, six and seven in OD cricket), never mind scores many runs, in the one-day games (which are the televised ones). These are two contributory factors.

He's also never before this year had a really stellar year, averaged 39 in 2004, 34 in 2006 and 37 in 2007. Had a pretty decent year in 2005, averaging 48, but generally it takes a year averaging in the 50s or 60s to get you mentioned for the step-up, and this is the first year he's managed that.

He was also a relatively late starter - he's 27 now, nearly 28, and I guess he could hope for an England A tour this winter. If so, it'd be the first time he'd have played First-Class cricket for someone other than Worcestershire, and in a career now spanning 5 years, that's very unusual.

Kieswetter is probably a better option (assuming England don't want to pick another keeper who is actually English)

 

[Richard]

Kieswetter's also a wicketkeeper and lower-order batsman - Moore is an opener who to my knowledge has never had any protestations whatsoever as a wicketkeeper.

BTW, figures like this are the stuff cricket dreams are made of:

GJ Batty 3-2-1-0

 

[zaremba]

Well it looks like rain is going to save Lanky. The irony! Good weather at Hove when they won, miserable weather at OT to save their sodden skins when the going gets tough. I trust we will never hear them whinge about their swamp-like conditions again...

 

[Manee]

Simon Jones takes 5/110 to continue his great form this season which has heralded 42 wickets at 18.02 with a strike rate of 30.1.

 

[fredfertang]

Well it looks like rain is going to save Lanky. The irony! Good weather at Hove when they won, miserable weather at OT to save their sodden skins when the going gets tough. I trust we will never hear them whinge about their swamp-like conditions again...

Oh yes you will

Every sodden year the rain robs Lancashire of the title and before anyone says otherwise that is an evidence based assertion and not just some Lancastrian looking at history through Red Rose tinted spectacles - it said it in Wisden so it must be right!

 

[zaremba]

Fertang I wondered when you were going to show up in this thread.

I hope that the deluge washes Stuart Law into the Irish channel, never to be found. The man's record against Sussex (he averages 2,350 over the course of 45 seasons) makes me sick.

 

[Richard]

Simon Jones takes 5/110 to continue his great form this season which has heralded 42 wickets at 18.02 with a strike rate of 30.1.

Not quite as obscene as it was at one point when he was striking at something like 18 () but still I can recall almost no occasions where he's got genuinely poor figures.

Something that can't, truth be told, be said about Kabir Ali.

 

[Richard]

I hope that the deluge washes Stuart Law into the Irish channel, never to be found. The man's record against Sussex (he averages 2,350 over the course of 45 seasons) makes me sick.

And even worse, he signed-up for that ICL lark. I hope his contract runs-out sooner than expected.

 

[GIMH]

I'd give anything to be in a selectorial meeting where Simon Jones was being discussed. His inclusion in the CT30 shows that he is in their thinking, but will he go to India?

 

[Richard]

Surely he must?

I'm not too unhappy with the line of reasoning (which it now seems almost certain that they've taken-up) that he had to play all 5 months of this season without mishap in order to get back in the frame, but to delay it any longer would make little sense.

 

[fredfertang]

Fertang I wondered when you were going to show up in this thread.

I hope that the deluge washes Stuart Law into the Irish channel, never to be found. The man's record against Sussex (he averages 2,350 over the course of 45 seasons) makes me sick.

Thats a bit harsh Mr Z - I would have thought with the reguarity with which you have pinched our title in recent seasons you could afford to be a bit more magnanimous

 

[GIMH]

Surely he must?

I'm not too unhappy with the line of reasoning (which it now seems almost certain that they've taken-up) that he had to play all 5 months of this season without mishap in order to get back in the frame, but to delay it any longer would make little sense.

Yeah, the team selection for India could well be fascinating though. Flintoff at seven made a lot more sense than at six, but four bowlers would mean playing a second spinner is unrealistic, and we are going to want two spinners in India. Flintoff plays if he is fit, meaning the following compete for two spots, it would seem:

Sidebottom
Anderson
Jones
Harmison
Broad

Broad shouldn't get a game out of that lot, and really Sidebottom and Anderson have both earned runs in the team, particularly Anderson. Harmison, though, could take a hatful tomorrow and it would then be hard for the selectors to drop him, but with Jones bowling so well domestically he is surely worth a pick in the Tests.

Writing all that you'd think we had an embarassment of riches for fast bowlers, but competition for places is a good thing and it is certainly an improved situation.