Tag: Matty Potts

Thoughts On New England Squad

My thoughts on the England squad for the first two tests against New Zealand, announced today.

The England squad for the first two tests against New Zealand was announced today – the first major announcement since the appointment of Brendon McCullum as new head coach of the test side. Also announced today was the appointment of Matthew Mott as new head coach of the England men’s white ball side. Mr Mott has experience of rendering a powerful side close to invincible having come to this job from being head coach of the Aussie Women’s side, who became during his tenure arguably the most dominant international cricket side there has ever been. The rest of this post looks at the new test squad and my thoughts about it.

THE SQUAD

The screenshot below, from the secret pear (Worcestershire are known as The Pears) twitter account shows the squad:

THE BATTERS AND KEEPER

Zak Crawley and Alex Lees will open. Lees is a sound call, having demonstrated in the West Indies that he can bat for decent periods of time. Crawley is a quite abysmal selection, with a test average of 28.60, which drops to 22.16 if you take his one freak performance against Pakistan out of the equation, and is 18.60 since he scored that 267. He averages 30.5 for Kent, and is averaging less than 20 for them this season. Among the openers to have shown form this season, which Crawley has not, are Burns, Sibley, Tom Haines, Chris Dent and Crawley’s own Kent team mate Ben Compton. Any of these five would definitely have been a better pick than Crawley.

Ollie Pope is scheduled to bat at three, which is one place higher than he has ever batted for Surrey. Pope is a fine batter who may yet start reproducing his county form at test level, but seeking turn him into a number three is a) foolish and b) downright insulting to Bohannon, Bracey and Abell (Bohannon has an FC average 47.5, while the other two have scored runs this season though can’t match his record) all of whom are regular number threes England might have turned to.

Joe Root will bat in the number four slot where he has been so brilliant down the years, the first likely pick that I unequivocally agree with.

Jonathan Bairstow is likely to bat at five in spite of the fact that a) he has a poor record there at test level and b)he is not currently playing long form cricket having followed the money to India, and c)he has not exactly had a sparkling IPL either. Harry Brook has earned his place in the squad with an avalanche of runs for Yorkshire (over 750 this season and we are still in mid-May, and I would prefer to see him picked ahead of Bairstow but suspect Bairstow will get the nod.

Number six will be the new skipper, Ben Stokes. Number six is a sensible slot for an all rounder, but whether Stokes can cope with being skipper and being fast bowling all rounder remains to be seen. Nonetheless this one is indisputable for the present.

Number seven and the gloves will almost certainly both go to Ben Foakes who has had a fine early season for Surrey and deserves an extended run in the England side. For those who are hellbent on getting Bairstow in one way to do so would to put Foakes at five, where he bats for Surrey and Bairstow at seven, where he has done well for England in the past.

THE BOWLERS

The pace/swing/seam department is severely injury hit (ironically the oldsters, Anderson and Broad are both fully fit). I am pleased that Matty Potts who has been bowling like a demon for Durham has been included and slightly disappointed that Parkinson of Lancashire has not, but Jack Leach, chosen to fill the spinners slot (and only one will play on an English pitch) is in excellent form and I don’t grudge him his place. I expect that the perceived need to deepen the batting will see an England 8,9,10,11 of C Overton, Broad, Leach, Anderson, but I would like to see Potts make his debut in place of C Overton in that line up. If you are getting the impression that I am a good deal less bothered by the bowling than I am by the batting give yourself 10/10 – I am not unhappy with the chosen bowlers whereas I consider that the batting choices leave a lot to be desired.

XIs – THEIRS AND MINE

I end the business part of this post with two XIs – the one I think will be named and the one I would name from the selected squad.

Their likely XI: Crawley, Lees, Pope, Root, Bairstow, *Stokes, +Foakes, C Overton, Broad, Leach, Anderson.

The XI I would name from this squad (though like the Irishman being asked for directions “I wouldn’t start from here”): Crawley, Lees, Pope, Root, Brook, *Stokes, +Foakes, Potts, Broad, Leach, Anderson.

Overall I award the selectors 6/10 for their efforts – Crawley’s retention on its own is worth three marks off, while Bairstow cannot be regarded as an ideal test selection, and while circumstances allow for leniency regarding the seam/ swing/ pace selections I also cannot approve the continuing refusal to pick Parkinson. Also as I have said I regard the attempt to turn Pope into a number three as foolish, and between them these misgivings amount to another mark off in addition to the hit for retaining Crawley.

PHOTOGRAPHS

My usual sign off…

Yesterdays Results and Predictions for Today

The outcome of yesterday’s predictions, and accounts and predicitions from today’s Royal London Cup matches plus some other features.

INTRODUCTION

Today we beign with a look back at such actions as there was in yesterdays two Royal London Cup matches, and then around the grounds at today’s matches, most of which are now at the half-way stage.

YESTERDAY’S MATCHES

Just the two games:

  • Middlesex v Surrey – Middlesex 277 all out from 50 overs, Surrey 240 all out from 48 overs, Middlesex won by 37 runs.
    Surrey were always behind the rate in this one, although they retained hope until Ben Foakes (71, the highest individual score of the game) was out. For Middlesex Tom Helm and Nathan Sowter each took four wickets. I had called this one for Surrey.
  • Glamorgan v Kent – Glamorgan 68-2 from 15 overs, no result, rain
    The rain never did ease in this one, so ended as a no result. Kent would have been heavy favourites had the rain eased off enough to allow them a 10 over run chase of what would presumably have been around about 75-80. As it is, although my comments on this one allowed for the possibility of the weather triumphing I can hardly count it as a successful prediction, since I really called it in Kent’s favour.

Thus, for the first time in six match days I was wrong on more predictions than I was right on – 0/2 to be precise. However, my record remains 18/29.

TODAY’S PREDICTIONS

A number of matches to call…

  • Hampshire v Gloucestershire – Hampshire 331-8 from 50 overs
    At 65-4 this was looking poor for Hampshire, but James Vince and Liam Dawson rescued the home team with a stand 186, before Dawson was out for 73. Vince went on to a Hampshire List A record individual score of 190, being out with one ball remaining in the innings. Chris Liddle with 4-66 was the star of the Gloucestershire bowlers. Thanks to Vince’s innings I think Hampshire will win this one. The commentary team featured Emily Windsor, a 21 year old batter for Hampshire Women.
  • Northamptonshire v Worcestershire – Worcestershire 254-9 from 50 overs.
    A modest total by today’s standards for Worcestershire. Hamish Rutherford made 126, but no one else reached 30. For Northants Cobb, Sanderson,  Keogh  and Buck all took two wickets, while Muzarabani was economical in his opening spell (1-13 from five overs). I expect Northants to knock these off with some comfort.
  • Nottinghamshire v Leicestershire – Nottinghamshire 433-7 from 50 overs
    A huge total for Nottinghamshire. All of the top six in their order reached fifty, the scores being as follows: Chris Nash 56 off 53, Joe Clarke 55 off 44, Ben Duckett 86 off 61, Jake Libby 66 off 52, Tom Moores 50 off 32 and Steven Mullaney 81 off 41. Gavin Griffiths took 3-92 from nine overs and I will spare the blushes of the remaining Leicestershire bowlers.
  • Warwickshire v Durham – Warwickshire 248-8 from 50 overs
    62 from Tim Ambrose and 50 a piece from Sam Hain and Chris Woakes saved Warwickshire from complete disaster, but this is a modest score (only one lower total was defended in this competition last season, and only one so far this season). For Durham Ben Carse had 3-46, Matty Potts 2-46 and the two most economical bowlers, Liam Trevaskis and Ben Raine, each with 1-29 from seven overs did not get to bowl their full allocation! Nevertheless, I expect Durham to win this one with something to spare.
  • Yorkshire v Derbyshire – Yorkshire 308-2 in 40 overs, rain has intervened.
    Huge scoring from Yorkshire, and with only two wickets lost they were heavy favourites for a 400plus score when the rain came. This will be reflected in the adjusted total that Derbyshire have to chase – the scoring rate required will certainly by a minimum of 8.25 an over, perhaps 8.50 or even 9.00 depending on how many overs are left for the Derbyshire innings (the D/L bases these things on resources, which include wickets and overs remaining, and with 20% of their overs and 80% of their wickets remaining Yorkshire had plenty of resources to have a real dart in the closing stages of their innings). Therefore, assuming that the rain eases sufficiently for a match to be completed I expect Yorkshire to win comfortably. All four Yorkshire players who batted had 50s: Tom Kohler-Cadmore 79 off 92, Adam Lyth 78 off 60, David Willey 72 not out off 49 and Harry Brook 59 not out off 40. The Derbyshire biolwing figures are best not talked about.

The other game, between Essex and Somerset at Colchester was scheduled to start at 1:00PM but delayed by rain until 3PM and is already reduced to 39 overs per side. It is too early to attempt to call this one, though Somerset have made a decent start.

LINKS AND PICTURES

Emboldened by the fact that a petition calling for him to be sacked had garnered 40,000 signatures Farmer’s Weekly put up a poll asking whether people thought the BBC should sack Chris Packham. At the moment 71% of the 78208 people who have voted are in the “no” camp along with me (this means that 55,579 voters do not think he should be sacked, comfortably exceeding the number of signatories to the petition). Click here to view the article and vote if it is still open.

From brilliant.org I offer you a little teaser:

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Three twitter finds to lead up to my regular sign off:

Now for my regular sign off…

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