Scotty; A Winter Well Spent

Scott Borthwick spent his winter in Adelaide learning more about the dark arts of legspin.  He got to spend time with Shane Warne and Mushtaq Ahmed.  They were very complimentary about him.    So too were TMS when the Ashes show moved into town.

Now he is applying that winter work with some success.

He was instrumental in our win over Warwickshire.  A double wicket maiden is always good when you are trying to restrict a team’s second innings total.  He got 3 of the top order batsmen in a match altering spell.  Recording a personal best of 4 wickets for 25 off of thirteen overs, which saw the Bears all out with a lead of only 101.

And with Diva struggling with a thigh strain, Scott successfully stepped into the breach as opening batsman. And with 48 unbeaten runs, lead the team to victory with a final boundary.

And all that just a few days after his 21st Birthday.

And the Winner Is….?

…Not us, not this time.

It is the last match round of this years County Championship.  By this time last year we had won, unbeaten all year with two matches in hand. But this year is more like 2008, down to the wire.  Nottingham the leaders, slipped up and left us as Champions on the last day of that season.

The Championship really is the finest cricket on offer, especially in it’s first Division – there have been some stunning matches this season, many with exciting tight finishes.  If there have been draws it has often been because of weather affecting the match, batting out for a draw has been very rare this year.  Not being able to use the heavy roller and a points system favouring wins have forced competitive play.  This has been a hard fought competition without dead matches.

This year Nottingham, Somerset and Yorkshire are all in contention to win, the weather is out there too.  Notts have a slender lead, their fate is in their hands, but any slip up and less than full bonus points…..  Even the media are interested – Sky will actually broadcast live Championship action, they have chosen the Notts match.  Notts have buckled before, they did in 2008.   BBC radio are doing coverage of all four division 1 matches, the website is providing live text cometary too – all go!

Yorkshire play Kent – who will look for a good win to save them from relegation, meaning that the Hampshire Warwickshire clash cannot afford to be complacent.

We have our part to play – Somerset will need a win and all the bonus points they can take from us.  But we have players conscious of contract negotiations, we are at home and there is some rain forecast…

It is going to be an exciting end to a fantastic season.