View From The Blues: Encouraging signs after opening games
Whereas last season was about high expectation and low achievement, this season will have to be about low expectation and anything else is a bonus.
Such was the collapse in form and confidence from the players and fans last year, the likes of captain Nicky Boje and Andrew Hall are really going to have to step it up in 2009 to fill those gaps.
Unless one of our new English seamers makes a big impact early on then Johan van der Wath's workload may be too much and cost us the big match wins we just couldn't nail last year.
I have a good feeling we will make a quarter-final this season, although let's hope we don't have to choose between the pre-sold Aussie tour match that clashes with the Lord's final if it does go well in the 50-over game!
Coach David Capel doesn't want to be fiddled out of that F&P cup run like he was last season!
With money tight following the death of benefactor Lynn Wilson, this year's budgets are sure to be seriously squeezed in the downturn, and so I'm not going to criticise the squad put together for 2009.
This season's domestic cricket is all about planning for 2010, those floodlights, and the long-awaited seating capacity on the east side of the ground for the Twenty20 revolution.
We have signed a deal with a well-known real ale company who will sponsor the Twenty20 team this year, and booze on the shirt is all very appropriate if you consider last season's sloppy antics!
It was a bit cheeky of the coach to suggest he was listening to the fans and giving youth a chance in the opening championship match against Leicestershire last week by playing Ben Howgego and David Willey.
Surely they were only in the side to replace the injured David Sales and the absent Niall O'Brien? But, in Capel's defence, the selections worked out well.
It was certainly an advantage to bat first at Grace Road with the weather the way it is in April, and Howgego and Stephen Peters critically took the shine off the ball with a useful 60 opening partnership on a greenish one.
Rob White lost his stump to a straight one and initiated another collapse, but enter Hall and debutant Willey, taking the score from a perilous 111 for five to a comfortable 274 for six, young Willey out for 60 on his first-class debut.
He was an excellent selection by the coach ahead of Alex Wakely and Mark Nelson.
Just as a rather slim line Zulu made the middle order his front room in the championship last season, Andrew Hall was also looking more committed after a winter in South Africa, the hero for us with his first century for Northants as the boys were eventually bowled out for 387 after four sessions were lost to rain.
Hall really could excel in that Klusener role, and he will certainly make team selection easier and more balanced this season if he stays fit.
So over to the bowling.
Both Daggett and Cummins added to the wage bill but not the starting 11 here, with David Wigley again first change, and he did bowl a tight line at Grace Road.
What we do know, bowling-wise, is there’s nothing much wrong with the very attacking opening pair of van der Wath and David Lucas with the new cherry, and Leicestershire were soon 19 for five with the ball doing all sorts.
The pair shared seven wickets before the close of day three.
It was a big ask to take 12 wickets on the final day in bright sunshine, but the boys went for it, enforcing an excellent follow-on with 183 all-out. But it was not to be second time around and every clunk of straight bat on ball was one less spectator in a quickly-emptying ground,
Dipenaar and Nixon secured the draw with a 70-un partnership from 104 for four. A haul of 11 points is a solid start for Capel though and set the boys up well for the current match with Kent.
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Friday 10 February 2012
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