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28 Mar 2024, Edition - 3180, Thursday

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Sports

County cricket’s outsiders spy chance to audition for unsettled England

The Guardian

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It is never a good sign when the selectors are anxiously awaiting the start of the County Championship. It means there is a need for some new candidates to play in an unsettled England Test team. Moreover, it is not entirely reassuring when we do not know the identity of the selectors looking out for those new players. But that is where we are this April.

For the rest of us the start of the championship is a happy reminder that spring is upon us. The anorak and the flask must be dusted down for those prepared to brave April’s winds and showers. There will be five early rounds of championship matches, the first beginning this Friday and the last finishing on 14 May.

From 19 August until 27 September there will be six more rounds, which means that there are four rounds allocated to the middle of the summer. Enjoy them while you can. There is unlikely to be so much championship cricket in the middle of the season from 2020 onwards.

For our cricketers there is plenty to play for this spring, which brings extra spice and a few dodgy newspaper intros as run scorers keep “sending memos” to the selectors, whoever they may be. Anyone who hits a stash of early season runs, especially in the eight‑team First Division, has a chance of being elevated to the Test team.

Lancashire, who begin their campaign against Nottinghamshire at Old Trafford, can expect regular scrutiny since their lineup contains three batsmen who have been with the Lions throughout the winter. Keaton Jennings, once of Durham, is now a colleague of Haseeb Hameed and the new club captain, Liam Livingstone. By the same token the progress of Joe Clarke, Dan Lawrence and Nick Gubbins will be monitored closely but this season more unfamiliar names have the chance to “nudge” those selectors with a run of high scores. On the fast bowling front, anyone who has extra pace and/or propels the ball with his left hand will be of great interest if they start taking wickets regularly.

But beyond the need to improve the Test team there are a surprising number of cricket fans who have a simpler passion for championship cricket. They are only really concerned about how their team are doing. Many will be following surreptitiously at work, startling colleagues with the odd seemingly unprovoked oath when they spot that Trescothick has gone early at Taunton or Collingwood has departed cheaply at Chester‑le‑Street (these are the much-beloved senior members left on the circuit). And a few of those fans will actually be there, renewing friendships of last September.

Last summer Essex romped to the title with Chris Silverwood, now England’s bowling coach, in the Pep Guardiola role. It is unlikely to be so easy for them this time. The others are forewarned. By September last year every other side in the division was more concerned about avoiding the drop than winning the pennant that Essex had all but secured. In the end, Middlesex were relegated alongside Warwickshire.

So this year in the top division there are three non-Test match counties – it’s such an ugly phrase it might be easier just to call them “the intruders”. Essex, Somerset and Worcestershire have the impertinence to challenge those clubs who have been given the opportunity and the potential financial dividend of hosting the new Twenty20 tournament in 2020. In the long-term the intruders will do well to survive against the increasing financial might of their opponents.

The 10-team Second Division contains several sides whose ambition will not extend much beyond grabbing some one‑day glory. But Middlesex and Warwickshire will obviously have their sights set on an immediate return to Division One, with Sussex – now under the guidance of Jason Gillespie even though he is always being touted for an international post with Australia or England – a likely intruder.

So let the sun shine on Friday. The English game always looks so stupid when the start of the season coincides with snow showers and that is the last thing that the England and Wales Cricket Board wants after a tricky winter. The board must be nervous about the state of the game, of which it is the guardian. There is some bewilderment out there as the ECB seems inclined to keep offering handouts to counties for not hosting Test cricket and for voting in favour of a T20 competition that is much more attractive to TV executives than the real fans. In the meantime it is prepared to underwrite the costs of the threatened libel suit of its chairman, Colin Graves, against Cricinfo, which is, perversely, one of the outlets seeking to give domestic cricket in England a high profile.

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