And off we go again - 2022 season
By Grockle et al
April 11 2022
All is right with the world. The cricket season is here!! In our case the 28th we have covered as an independent web presence. But all is not right is it? Let's look at where we are and what the prospects might be for this 2022 summer.
Somerset go into the 2022 season professing great expectations for the summer ahead but it is an uncertan time for the county. Despite selling out of white ball memberships and drivving forward with commmercial sponsors we are not a favoured county in the wider central plans because of our provincial 'non urban' nature.
The ECB plans seem to be geared around an urban more 'regional' structure. Their franchise scheme does not include the South West of the country (whatever they keep saying about Cardiff being their South West 'British' centre). As far as England is concerned, that ends at Birmingham.
After the winter Tom Harrison is talking about the 'opportunity' for a rest and the rumours coming out are for a sort of Premier League of 12 'somethings' with a 'Championship' of another 6 'somethings' below that. 18 counties go into that structure but one has to assume that 8 of the 'Premier' 'somethings' will be the bases of the 8 franchises already existing.
Now the franchises are designed NOT to be located in a place they couldn't move from but 6 of them are based at the general Test venues of Old Trafford, Headingley, Trent Bridge, Edgbaston, The Oval and Lord's - don't expect them to move. They cut Durham loose after a large investment blaming the county for its problems. They may go back there to include the North of the country above the Pennines. They could cut loose the Welsh and move the 'Fire' franchise somewhere to placate the foot of the country that they have ignored because of its lack of big population centres below Bristol - now there is a thought I'm sure they have had. The other franchise placating a poor investment choice on a national basis earlier in the century would be the movement of the franchise in Hampshire - the South Eastern 'Durham' if you like.
So there is the chance of moving the bases of the 'franchises' but half of them are set irrespective of where those counties presently stand in the Championship. The lack of marketing of the red ball game by the central management suggests it isn't a priority of the ECB despite things they might say. The emphasis at the start of April was very much end of season franchise based - coincidence? Well it is a strange organisation who are competing internally with their own competitions.
So what does this mean for Somerset? The second year of the franchises means we lose 9 players to that competition in late July and August - a large number for a non Test county. It cuts our campaigns into two pieces. It affected us badly last year in one way. Our squad could compete in all 3 competitions we are involved in and we will play once more in front of big houses (the majority of Blast! home seats were sold before the season started). Our international players are with us for most of the season. Matt Renshaw is late and will not compete in the T20 tournament but he will bolster our red ball side we hope. Peter Siddle will be here for all three tournaments and Marchant de Lange willbe available for 2 events as he is one of the people we lose for the franchise period. There is the possiblity of more international investment for the T20 should we decide to go that way. It isn't likely.
Our championship side MUST perform well. There is no information about how the ECB will decide the members of the 'Twelve' if it happens but the review will start in 2023 - we cannot be in the lower levels of Championship finishers because despite our progress as a county we are a provincial 'thorn' in the side of the ECB - a county who succeeds without a Test venue base or large city support. We don't fit their mould and they would like us out of the picture. We did not do well at the end of 2021 and have not sarted 2022 any better. We have presently lost our last 5 Championship games badly. four by an innings and the other one by 10 wickets. Admitedly the first one of this season against Hampshire can partly be put down to not having 9 poossible first team choices available. However, we have to hit back hard and fast or we are in the doldrums of the Championship at a time when we have to be in the forefront. 2022 is a serious red ball season for the county. If we get it wrong it could be our last!!
Our white ball T20 season offers a lot. We have exciting players in most areas but none are yet true stars of the format. it is a developing side with some very good prospects. We should qualify for the second tier of games but we have said that before and our performances have been inconsistent ranging from the sublime to the ridicuous and we have scraped in or failed too often. A solid set of league games is needed as this is what the ECB will look at as a more strong indicator of their requirements of UK cricket centres going forward I am sorry to say. We also need to keep our young players interested in succeeding at the county or the worry is that will look elsewhere for future progression.
The 50 over tournament is not an ECB interest. They will swamp coverage of their alternative at the time this takes place. The BBC says it will cover it but their coverage is not equal to that they make of the one they broadcast during the same period of time. From our point of view we have blooded a significant number of fringe players during it. Many of the debutants from last year will be back as experienced 50 over representatives this year. Ben Green came to the fore as the captain in 2021 annd he sould be back in charge for the second year when other candidates are elsewhere playing for other sides. We will have more experienced players available for it this year as two of our internationals will be able to play in it. We shold hope to qualify for the second stage after faltering in 2021.
The Championship is the first tournament to start and I think I can say without contradiction that it is the most important one of the season for the future of the county. We have to improve, we have to improve quickly and we have to make a good showing in 2022 to stop providing reasons for central management to marginalise our involvement in all forms of cricket going forward. Good white ball placings will help but without the red ball status we could be between a rock and a hard place when the new standiings of the cricket system are decided by those who don't seem to care about loyalty, history, long term development or any other aspects but the short form profit margins.
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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2022:04:16:16:09:13 by Grockle.
I'd better not go on...
LoL
Seventy-eight Seasons a Somerset Supporter
Either the present group find a way out of the performance abyss into which they have descended, or they will not be playing CC cricket for Somerset in future, as Somerset will not be playing CC cricket if excluded from the planned “top table.”
Techniques to stay calm during a batting collapse, being relaxed in the dressing room when wickets are tumbling is the first step. Then what?
ECB won't do us any favours, forget them. Covid is everyone's problem. Getting injured in pre-match training unfortunate. We have Renshaw now and can't complain on losing many batsmen to other counties.
But how would you change the batting performance around?
Sadly, only good luck for Somerset (with the fitness of Siddle, Davey and Gregory) and bad luck for Craig Overton (England not wanting him anymore) can fix this.
Why?
Because it’s not the top six batting performance that has markedly deteriorated. They’ve generally been poor for many years and continue to be poor.
The performance drop off has been in the bowling and that’s because of lack of availability, really, rather than performance drop-off from established bowlers. Our bowling depth is not once it once was and that has become a factor in coping when we have injuries to first choice bowlers.
To be honest, a case could have been made for not signing Renshaw and, instead, grabbing another overseas seamer (if we’re suddenly content to have and in a financial position to have three overseas pros).
Of course it’s to be hoped that MR has the near miraculous performance that he did last time. If he could repeat that, then that would take pressure off Tom Abell, who is the one member of the top six who has descended into a performance abyss, averaging 8 across the 5 heavy defeats. But any batsmen is only ever a couple of good balls or bad decisions away from failure and our MO has been to win games in spite of our top six, and not because of them.
We had to get a quality batsman to hang the rest around. We saw last week what that absence created. Whether Renshaw is that Chris Rogers-like batsmen is yet to be seen but unless Devon or Dean were about it had to happen.
We have varying levels of quality that have to establish their credentials before the experienced older guys pack up and our last tranche of Academy flow throughs become the old guys. We've removed the 'chaff' and now we need to see these 'kernels' grow... if they can.
If they don't?
You might want to try having a look at their averages for a more realistic picture…
Here are the returns for the first five wkts in the home games that season:
Vs
Kent: 130 and 90
Surrey: 211
Warks: 77 and 68
Hants: 361 and 325 (miracle)
Notts: 132 and 79
Yorks: 70 and 191
Essex: 75
We made fewer than 100 runs for the first 5 wickets 50% of the time!
Would you seriously contend that that is somehow not deserving of the epithet “poor”!?
Vs
Warks 166 and 170
Yorks: 85 and 167
Surrey: 225 and 116
Hants: 45 and 95
Notts: 310 (miracle!)
Essex: 68 and 65
So 5 out of 11 times we were five down for less than 100 on their travels.
So this top six that you contend weren’t poor in 2019 lost 5 wickets for fewer than 100 runs in 11 of 23 first innings. Basically, whenever there was anything much in the deck? They flopped in embarrassing fashion.
In an ideal world, you want top six batsmen to average 40. That would imply 200 runs for the first 5 wickets.
In 2019, when you are trying to imply that they were somehow good, they hit that 200 or more for 5 standard five times in 23 tries - a hit rate of less than 25%.
Abell 31.50
Bartlett 31.21
Banton 29.61
Davies 27.91
Azhar 24.57
Hildreth: 23.04
Trescothick: 10.75
Vijay: 8.40
Which of these averages are not “poor”?
Tom Abell 91st place.
He was our best placed player.
So there you go.. bonus points were not a good measure of the efficacy of our top six in 2019.
Kent: 31 and 153
Surrey: 187
Warks: 132 and 96
Hants: 47 and 88/3 and then Dec
Notts: 194 and 90
Yorks: 129 and 138
Essex: 128
A cursory look at those first innings should tell you something, AF, about the origins of those bonus points…
And I know you will all come back with "Ahh but the stats say they won't do better"
and my resposne to that is "If they don't do better then we'll be at the bottom and it still won't have made any real difference what they did in 2018 or 2019.
I am sure the top batsmen at every county are aware of what their averages were in previous seasons. I doubt any of them are going - "Well I'd better do that again then". They will all be trying to improve on the previous figures and if they were awful then they will try harder to do better.
The side that gets the most improvement will make the most progress. If you assume nothing in Somerset will change then you already know what the end result will be and the season will be a bit of a bore for you. I'm willing to be surprised and improvements will be welcome when they come as with James Hidlreth and Ben Green in the last game.
LIttle victories "A journey of a thousand miles starts with one step"
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2022:04:12:15:28:20 by Grockle.
Clearly looking at the averages of the top six is a rather more instructive measure of their performance. And looking at the first 5 wkts Vs the last 5 is a good way of weighing the relative contribution of the two halves of the order.