Middlesex CCC
Middlesex all over the place
Almost as good as it got
By Leprechaun
June 19 2015
London Leprechaun gives us a take on the T20 at Lords againt Hampshire. Not much to say excert that it wasn't very good, could have been better and most definitley was not new England. Come back Eoin we need you.
Sitting in a traffic jam on the way to Lord’s I was not exactly filled with confidence about this match. And seeing our team did not exactly help. Where were our big hitters outside Stirlo? Simmo at 4? No reflection on him and the way he has batted recently. No TRJ? Might need his batting if not his bowling. I know we have batsmen missing but the selection seemed lightweight. Not exactly new England. We needed Eoin Morgan to sprinkle some distant magic on us.
As you know by now sadly no magic appeared; only a series of slightly odd decisions culminating in another loss that was not that far of us getting there. And of course Owais Shah continued his good form against us. I am struggling to remember him failing against us for any other county.
- Why open with Ollie? That tactic seems outdated now and though his first over was not expensive in any context there seemed little point on a decent batting pitch.
- Why keep rotating bowlers after just one over? I know it gives batsmen little chance to settle but it gives bowlers no chance to get into rhythm. And it leads to too much chatting about field placings, which put us close to penalty runs for a slow over rate (Where have you heard that before?)
- Why did Neil Dexter only bowl one over when that went for just five runs? I am a huge supporter of him but at the moment his main value to the side is in bowling. So why keep him back?
Our only real hope in full flow
- When we batted why did Nick Compton take first strike not Stirlo? t took five balls and a wicket to get him on strike –then he hit his first ball for four. And another over at least to get him back on strike. Wasted balls which might have made a difference, given the way he played.
- Why didn’t we change our batting order when Simmo was out so the bigger hitters (Abott, Harris, Rayner) could carry on the momentum which was causing some concern to Hampshire.
- Why didn’t we spot the last ball no ball for field placings which made the target 200? Only two runs but psychologically annoying!
- Why did we bowl so many front foot no balls in the first place.
As for Hampshire they played it perfectly. Carberry staying in for the whole innings – giving the strike to Owais Shah and then Ervine for a brutal cameo at the end which kept the score going. But he still scored at a decent rate when he had the strike.
And as for Lord’s it looked lovely on a nice sunny evening , though floodlights were pretty unnecessary so near to the longest day and flares for boundaries are fairly pointless in a match played largely in broad daylight. The PA kept trying to get the crowd going which was mainly unsuccessful; it came to life itself for the brief period of Middlesex dominance in the Simmo/Stirling partnership.
Right towards the end Middlesex players appeared on the big screen to wish us well for the next match. The out takes were funnier.
At least going home I could ponder on whether to delete T20 Quarter Final and Finals day dates from my diary. And hope that the injured and missing players will be back soon or we will end up below Surrey. That would never do!
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Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2015:06:25:23:56:02 by BarmierKev.
I remember Ollie opening the bowling against us for Sussex andbowling Sterlo 2nd ball. Since then we have regularly tried it ourselves, but it always seems to me to lack conviction - rather as if we;ve heard that this is a tactic the top T20 teams employ. It does seem outdated now, though to be fair I thought Ollie did OK yesterday.
Paul Sterling was out at 10.4 overs, of which he only faced 4.3 overs. Some of that may have been down to bad luck or good management by Hampshire, but it does seem strange that he didn't get first strike and thus didn't face a ball until the last one of the opening over. However, it was great to see Sterling taking on the responsibility of being our one hope of winning. In previous seasons he's always seemed to me to have the attitude of going out to hit the ball as hard and high as possible, and if he's out there's always Malan or Morgan to come in. But yesterday I thought he played really intelligently, while still scoring at 2 runs oer ball.
It was a funny atmosphere yesterday: people seemed to be enjoying themselves but it all felt a bit flat. And the floodlights and flares all seemed rather unnecessary. Sitting in the Upper Tavern we could feel the heat from the flares - it can't have been doing much for the club's carbon footprint!
Funny thing is he thought Eoin Morgan's first name was pronounced Ewan.
Had to be hastily corrected by Kevin Hand.
The best thing for me from last season's T20 campaign was the exciting emergence of Ryan Higgins - even if it was all too late as Gus said "we waited until we couldn't qualify to play him" (or words to that effect in Middx Matters).
Yet Higgins hasn't featured at all, while as per last season more experienced players continue to be picked and FAIL ahead of him.
Sorry but the coaching staff are clueless when it comes to T20, I've said it before we need a new coach from the modern era otherwise we will continue going nowhere in all formats...
We just seem to either stand still or go backwards steadily at t20.
Will go to the Somerset game at Uxbridge as on my rest days.Other games,i just cant get interested anymore.
Thanks for the accurate report LL.
Need to blood new players from the seconds now...hasnt that been said before??
P23 L18 A1 W4
Exceptional.
Just not in a good way.
I hope Ryan Higgins is selected at some point in this competition despite Eoin Morgan, Dawid Malan and Joe Burns (as well as whoever succeeds Burns as overseas player when he leaves for Australia A duty) all being due to return at some point. Our Twenty20 side is probably only a couple of defeats away from the point when we start resting regulars from the County Championship side and instead select the likes of Higgins.
Hopefully we will be able to add a couple of more wins this season when we are back to full-strength.
Many of these decisions have been made by captains who have walked into the club and been quickly appointed to the said role.
Whilst James Franklin is an experienced player, whose excellent innings gave us a great victory at Taunton, his decision to insert Gloucestershire at Richmond because we like to chase (or words to that effect) was extraordinary to say the least.
On the two occasions we chased in T20 under his stewardship prior to Richmond, we lost both times. Perhaps he's suggesting we like losing ?
On Thursday, it was evident that young Poddy was struggling against a potent Hampshire batting line up but he was given three overs, whereas Dexter, who is in the T20 for his economical bowling, was given just one.
Hampshire and Gloucestershire are both good T20 sides and once they'd made decent totals batting first, it was always going to be difficult for us, regardless of the strength of our team.
However, I'm getting increasingly fed up at our T20 overseas signings. In recent seasons, Ryan McLaren, Kyle Mills, Dan Christian and now Kyle Abbott have all been disappointing save for a couple of cameos. Abbott takes the biscuit for missing a match to attend an awards ceremony. I'm assuming any award he received wasn't anything to do with his T20 prowess.
To end on a positive, it was good to see Simmo hitting the ball well in the last two games and he and Stirlo gave us all a bit of hope with that good stand that kept us in with a shout against Hants.
