Struggling Steelbacks need big guns to start firing to turn Blast form around

Well it is one the Steelbacks will be hoping that rings true over the coming matches as they look to turn around a stumbling start to their Vitality Blast campaign.

Wednesday night's loss to an impressive Birmingham Bears outfit was the third in four matches for new skipper David Willey's side, and the third on the trot at the County Ground.

All is not lost of course, far from it, and there is no need to panic.

There are 10 games still to play and just a two-point gap to the top four and qualification for the quarter-finals - but this was not the way it was supposed to be.

And it's not the way head coach John Sadler and his players, who currently seem so low in confidence and belief, wanted it to be.

Heavy investment has been made into T20 cricket at Wantage Road, and there will have been very few dissenting voices among the club's fanbase with the winter recruitment that was made.

Indeed, there will have been great enthusiasm.

Sadler went for proven ability, players with track records as long as both of his arms.

Experienced England white ball all-rounder and T20 World Cup winner Willey was tempted back to his hometown from Yorkshire on a four-year deal.

The 33-year-old is a top gun for hire in world short-form cricket, a star in IPL, the Big Bash League and The Hundred.

Chris Lynn, the Aussie batting sensation who led the 2022 Blast averages after hammering 516 runs in just 10 innings for Northants last summer, agreed to return.

He thrashed two unbeaten centuries for the club, the first to do so, as well as four half-centuries, and he also happens to be the leading run-scorer in BBL history in his homeland.

Another Aussie, AJ Tye, was signed fresh from claiming his fourth BBL title with Perth Scorchers in January.

The seamer is regarded as one of the finest T20 death bowlers in world cricket, and in the BBL final claimed the 300th T20 wicket of his career - the very first player to achieve the feat.

They are three star names that any team in the country would have been happy to sign.

But things, so far, have not quite worked out, for whatever reason that may be.

They are all players with class. But so far, that precious form has eluded them.

Tye is currently conceding of 11 runs per over and has yet to find his bowling groove.

Lynn has not quite found his boundary-hitting range and is averaging 16.5 after four innings, while Willey has shown glimpses of his undoubted class and ability, but is yet to really grab a game by the scruff of the neck.

But that is surely only a matter of time?

Throw into the mix the fact that Josh Cobb is also low on runs and Saif Zaib hasn't quite rediscovered his magic touch of 2022, and it all adds up to the struggle the Steelbacks are currently experiencing.

So can they turn it round? Of course they can.

The records of the club’s big players certainly suggest they are more than capable of doing so, and the belief within the team is that they will do just that, and results will turn.

As Ricardo Vasconcelos, who has been one of the hits of the campaign so far, says: “Games come really thick and fast, really quick, and who knows? By the end of next week we could be right back up near the top with four wins.

"If you start going on a roll, then who knows where you can end up?"

But they need to start getting wins quickly, otherwise this Blast campaign could be in danger being all over before it has really started.

And Friday night's home date with a Leicestershire Foxes side that lost their opening four matches offers the perfect opportunity for the Steelbacks to get back to winning ways.

But to do it, their class acts are going to have to start finding that form.