Inside-edge wrote:

KingofSpain wrote:

Great effort to get close from 11/3. Hain, Bethell and Garton can hold their heads high.
We gave them 20 runs too many with poor bowling and fielding.
Miles is just not good enough and the Kiwi is bang average. Hopefully those two can be replaced by Gleeson and Hassan for the quarter final.
Northants are a useful side but we will face better teams in the knockout phase.

100% agree with this. Add Gleeson and Hassan and the bowling is then at the same strength as the batting, a more balanced side. Anyone can have a bad game but with a balanced side it doesn’t impact the game as much.

It's curious how the narrative has changed over time. After the first 4 or 5 games everyone had huge concerns over our batting and acknowledged that the strength of our bowling was winning us matches, now that seems to have flipped on its head over the past week.

BristolBear wrote:

Andy wrote:

So you acknowledge that we've not been reliant on just 1 or 2 players then?

You say it's rare for any side to be putting out their strongest XI at this point of the season, indeed, and we're still topping our group looking at another 1/4 final.

We've not done badly thus far.

The meltdowns on here after we lose are incredible sometimes.

Reliant on 1 or 2 with bat and ball. So 2 in each, 3 or 4 all together was what I was going for.
And perhaps it was an exaggeration but it’s not far wrong either. Far closer than ‘everyone is contributing’.

Maybe my standards are higher than yours. You might be happy with 3 years of quarter final losses. If so you’ve had a great 3 years.
But we’ve spent a significant amount of money on this T20 squad, recruited a lot of T20 only players. Recruited so heavily in favour of t20 to the point that’s it’s clearly damaged the championship side. So the frame of reference for success isn’t one match or getting through the group. This side was built and targeted at winning the entire thing. Probably more so than any other side.
And yet, the mistakes of years past are currently being replayed again.
Being outplayed man on man, anyone can live with. But currently they’re making selection and tactical decisions that are hurting this side.
All I want is to give themselves the best chance to win when they walk out on that field. And currently they’re not.
And as I said, I’m not looking at this through the lens of 1 match, or the group stage. I’m looking at this through the lens of success is winning the competition. The amount of resource and effort that’s gone into this team, at the detriment of other areas, making the final is the minimum now. And currently we’re heading straight for another repeat of years gone by.
Carried by key players. Obvious weaknesses for all to see. Those weaknesses aren’t addressed or even acknowledged, and then they get exposed when playing a top side.

So my apologies that my standards, or was it meltdown, are beyond belief. But the club set this direction of travel, they’ve made the decision that this is the priority at the detriment of the championship side, and so they should be held to that. It’s much bigger than 1 game.

I appreciate what you're saying about the recruitment and how the side has been built and I agree the way the club has prioritised this comp to the detriment of others has been almost crass but you're acting like we've lost our quarter final match already. It's about 6/7 weeks away.

So you acknowledge that we've not been reliant on just 1 or 2 players then?

You say it's rare for any side to be putting out their strongest XI at this point of the season, indeed, and we're still topping our group looking at another 1/4 final.

We've not done badly thus far.

The meltdowns on here after we lose are incredible sometimes.

BristolBear wrote:

Highveld wrote:

Excellent from Sam, and Jacob, again, hower the top 3 failed again, and too many runs were conceded .

Too many players are allowed to underperform every game with no consequences.

It’s the same in every format.
We reward mediocrity. We’ve gone so far beyond showing faith in players.
What are the standards?
This is the issue we’ve had in previous years. Heavily reliant on 1 or 2 players who carry the batting and bowling. But remain obviously weak in certain areas, and these aren’t addressed. Then we expect that to be ok when we play the very best teams.

Disagree with this to a point, we've got 3 batters in Hain, Bethell and Mousley (I'm glad we did keep faith with the latter two) who are giving us good runs in most games and with regards to the bowling our spinners, as a unit, get the job done almost every time.

Who, Benjamin aside perhaps, shouldn't be in the side? Keep in mind the likes of Miles and probably Foulkes wouldn't be in the side if others were fit. They are just injury fill ins.

Highveld wrote:

Excellent from Sam, and Jacob, again, hower the top 3 failed again, and too many runs were conceded .

Too many players are allowed to underperform every game with no consequences.

Like who? I mean apart from Benjamin obviously.

The Bravo Rule

Obviously momentum and role definition is a big thing in white ball cricket and winning is a habit, but could we rest a couple of guys here?...

Some players just need backing through thick and thin, he's one of them.

Mousley is having a tremendous Blast campaign. What a brave player, very unselfish.

Not sure on Barnard, bowling isn't an option in T20 and he has gone 0, 0, 12 on his last 3 T20 innings opening the batting. Having said that it wouldn't be ridiculous to see him back in.

I'd imagine if their all fit and well it will be the same side that we had Friday.

I mean Garton probably had the worst T20 game of all time from anybody anywhere but he shouldn't get dropped. 2-0-49-0, run out the top scorer off yer first ball faced, then get clean bowled on the yer second ball faced! Incredible really.

Maybe a seamer for a spinner?

Interesting one today though, Derbyshire have turned us over the last 3 occasions we've played them at Edgbaston. Bit of a bogey side.

Yep, it's T20, it happens. Have said previously though that i do think Garton has these sort of brain fade overs in his locker. But it happens.

I'm not gonna be too critical of anyone, we've bowed and fielded really well, generally, all campaign.

KingofSpain wrote:

A real shame we didn't get to see much of him. Michael Rae had a bigger impact in a short time. I hope Jamal comes back stronger from the injuries.
Regardless, our recruitment of overseas players needs to be spot on. We need to find committed, quality players of the calibre of Donald and Patel.

Both of whom were rather unheralded at the time of them signing. Would supporters accept signing 'unknowns' as overseas even though they may have increased availability?

Always struck me as the kind of bowler who needs a bit in the pitch to be effective.

Does all the basics well.

Stranded on 98, horrendous, didn't even face in the last over.

Karma for his go-slow on Tuesday?!

whitelightning wrote:

Total comedy our signings for T20. The lack of a pace bowling option will cost us.

Who do you think we should have got in?

Which rounds were with the Kookaburra? Have Davie and Yates literally only made runs against the Kookaburra. They both made half centuries in the game v Somerset, was this against the Kooka?

Poor opening partnership for years? Davies struggled last season I'll give you that but Yates compared very favourably in comparison to other regular openers.

How many kookaburra rounds have we had thus far?

Read an article about the Worcestershire Nathan Smith pick up. Obviously not a household name, Alan Richardson along with other members of the Worcestershire coaching staff watched weeks of live stream action from NZ's domestic four day competition, really studying it and doing background checks on loads of different seamers before deciding on Smith. Really impressive stuff and he certainly does look a good pick up for Worcs. Fit, reliable and fast, bat's too.

Don't really want to be grading/ranking our defeats but this hurts more than the Essex for me.

You just know we wouldn't have even gone for these today had the circumstances been reversed.