a bad day at the office, preceded by a strange declaration

Two days since my last blog, and in that time Worcestershire let slip a perfect opportunity to win the first game of the season against the Bears, and then slipped to a crushing defeat at the hands of that canny one day team, Gloucestershire.

On day three of the championship game against Warwickshire, the Pears pushed home their advantage, with Solanki and Hick’s centuries adding to Moore’s ton in the first innings to give Worcestershire a seemingly unassailable lead. However, for some inexplicable reason, Solanki waited and waited to declare, leaving his bowlers just 16 overs at the end of the day, with a lead of nearly 500. With the weather forecast pointing towards showers on the last day this seemed a very strange decision.

However, he seemed when, just two overs after lunch Kabir took the wicket of Luke Parker to leave Warwickshire reeling on 109-7. That, however was the last of the meaningful play, as Tony Frost dug in for a 110 ball 46, and helped by 18 (78) from Botha salvaged a draw.
The late, negative declaration from a captain who has shown in the past he is not scared to risk losing to gain a victory was a baffling decision, and hopefully this cautiousness will not transcend for the whole season.

One reason, perhaps for the negative declaration could have been that Vikram was worried about the strength of his bowling attack. Simon Jones, who didn’t take the field after the first day with a ‘sore neck’ was a big miss from the line up, and with only Kabir and Gareth Batty he knew he could rely on he could have been worried that the attacking instincts of Maddy, Westwood or Poonia could have caused trouble. However, I would say this was a far too cautious, and VIkram will have some explaining to do.

Onto Bristol for the Sunday, and there were, as expected – and required in the case of Jones – some changes from the championship team for the opening match of the Friends Provident trophy.

Worcestershire will have high hopes for this trophy this year, as they performed well in limited overs competition towards the end of last year.

The one unexpected absentee from the team sheet was Graeme Hick who, having averaged over 70 in the pro40 at the end of last season, must have been left out to rest him for more important games. If this is going to be a common trend that that will please Moeen Ali, who was given his chance. The other change was debutant Chris Whelan, the winter acquisition from Middlesex, in for Jones.

The game did not start well, the opening pair of Steven Davies and captain Solanki both being removed by Steve Kirby with the score on 20. The redhead could be pushing for England contention this summer, and early wickets in one day competitions will do him no harm at all. Moeen and Steve Moore fell soon after, and Daryll Mitchell came to the wicket to join Ben Smith, with the score on just 46. These two put on somewhat of a recovery mission, putting on 129 before Mitchell fell for a nice looking 63. This, however, signalled a collapse, the next three wickets falling for just 22, and the innings closed on 221-8, a rate of 4.5 p/over never looking like quite enough.

And so the case was proved. The Gloucs top order feasted on some distinctly average seam bowling from Worcestershire, Gareth Andrew going for 53 off 6 overs, Kabir for 48 off 7 and Magoffin, at 6 p/over being the most economical. Chris Whelan did grab a couple of wickets, but these too were expensive and Kadeer Ali (63), Hamish Marshall (57) and Craig Spearman (64*) saw the Gladiators over the winning line with 14.4 overs to spare.

It was a disappointing result for the Pears, who will be hoping that the return of Simon Jones and Matt Mason will not be too far away, as judging by this bowling attack not too many teams will fear facing Worcestershire. The batting, too, was a concern. I don’t believe chopping and changing the order really works. Mitchell proved here he is a capable batsman, and he and Solanki could do a job up the order. Steven Davies, I feel, can be more effective I the middle overs, working the ball rather than hitting for big runs at the start.

The county championship resumes for Worcestershire on Wednesday against Leicestershire, and this is a must win game for the Pears if the feel good factor of the first three days of the new season is not going to quickly ebb away, as this game is followed by a visit from Somerset Sabres next Sunday – a match that will be tough to say the least.