LeicesterExile wrote:

Going a bit off subject but.... Has anyone any experience of the final being held at Trent Bridge in terms of does it get sold out like the T20 Finals Day? One of my sons follows Leics and is would prefer to see what the weather is like before committing to going.

I went to the 2021 final. About 10k there

I'd be surprised if it is sold out, though the fact that an East Midlands county is in the Final could make a difference.

Thanks Malc and Gerry

UrsaMinor wrote:

I suppose I'm being hopelessly naive but is it in order to ask why we were playing a Cup semi-final on a used wicket that even the opposition knew would be difficult to bat on? Is this another example of just where Warwickshire cricket sits in the "Edgbaston" priorities?

Questions need to be asked about the wicket we prepared. The toss should provide a slight advantage but not determine the outcome to such an extent.

Andy wrote:

Cant recall Surrey having an exceptional amount of white ball success and i think we've won the County Championship twice since Notts last won it. Think Essex have probably had more recent success than both to be fair.

We got Barnard in, other counties were interested. Rushworth got his contract at Durham torn up to come here. Moeen came here, other counties were interested. A very attractive offer got put Saqib Mahmoods way, he chose to stay at Lancs, that ain't on us. All within the past 12 months. We got Alex Davies in the season prior, other counties were in for him.

We recruit heavily in comparison to most other counties and we're still losing cup games so what is it?

We certainly don't have a predominantly "homegrown" squad.

The likes of Pennington, Haynes and Tongue (he'll be on the treatment table a lot, in fact he is right now) being Bears players wouldnt have changed today's result.

We have had to recruit heavily in recent years out of necessity due to the management neglecting to gradually replace an ageing squad.
It appears Davies was offered a leadership role in addition to a good salary, so that may have swung that one. Moeen was only ever going to join one county and we've hardly seen him anyway. Rushworth turned out to be a coup and I admit I was sceptical about that one.
More recruitment is needed because our best XI and those in reserve are not quite good enough right now.

Glad you acknowledge that we have indeed recruited heavily already.

People seem to think county cricket is like football in that you can just go out and sign 4 or 5 players and sort the team out, Cricket just doesn't work like that, Ashley Giles said this on numerous occasions in interviews across 2017 and 2018. The most successful county sides all have a strong nucleus of homegrown players (Essex, Somerset) and an excellent pipeline of talent from their academy and pathway. Surrey recruit well but they also consistently show a pathway to the first XI for homegrown talent and have had some excellent academy products in their 4day side.

It's far too simplistic to say recruitment is the be all and end all in cricket.

Warwickshire have been very active in recruiting from other counties for a good few years now and yet supporters seem to think the answer to us not winning knockout games is to recruit even more/harder. Take the 3 quarter final losses in a row in the Blast, the playing XI in each one of those games were all quite different each time, it's not like the same players have all failed every year. Compare the XI that lost away at Kent in 2021 with the XI that lost at home to Essex in 2023...two very different Bears teams. Maybe we have too big a turnover in players every other season due to recruitment?

One thing I will assert about our recruitment is that we have to do better at overseas players. However Directors of Cricket have my sympathy though as with the rise of franchise tournaments and a bloated international cricket calender its becoming harder to get a quality player to be available for county cricket for long periods. Look at next season with the T20 Blast, it will coincide with the T20 World Cup, all the best players will be tied up in that you'd think. It gets harder and harder to sign quality overseas players and when you do get a good one, like Maxwell, there is no guarantee they will perform.

I've seen people on here say things like '...we need a quality overseas middle order batter who can also captain in 4day cricket...'

Well yeah, every county wants that, but good luck finding one.