Yates looks like he wants a boundary every ball and Davies has come in swinging as well.

It will either get the scoreboard moving or we will soon be 22/3

Yorkshire, Lancs, Surrey & Somerset regularly blood 18/19/20 yr olds and get them to bed in to become good experienced players by the the time they are early to mid 20's.

My beef with players like Davies, Sidebottom and this season Miles just to mention 3 is that we could have put our own youngsters with potential in and fight a relegation battle .

Bethell could have a bowl now and be smacked around the park like Briggs has been all season, at least he would get some experience from it.

6 down now but Gloucs are having a go at us with nothing at all to lose.

We need a 1st innings lead here to force a win or we are done for as it is looking like both Somerset & Kent are well on there way to victories.

Just on us producing talent.

I think that we do produce players, the problem we have is that we do not then bring them through properly. All of the clubs mentioned above put youngsters in and then let them evolve through thick and thin. Brookes, after a couple of seasons hampered by injuries is now looking a decent bowler, Yates despite having a poor season was more or less ever present opening the batting last season so the club bring in Davies to mess that up! Bethel should retain his place whatever happens to make him feel part of things especially as he can bowl, Mousley & Benjamin are both talented youngsters who need to feel part of the red ball set up. The Lamb situation is just baffling.

I know it is a different format but Brookes, Bethell, Benjamin and Mousley were all deemed good enough for the hundred but we cant find regular game time for them?

E Brookes & Johal have suffered imo from not being given regular game time at 1st team level.

I would take any kind of scrambled survival over relegation but it has to be said that with the squad we have had at our disposal this season, it would be harsh on Somerset & Kent if we stayed up instead of them. Both of those teams were going to struggle along with Gloucs but they have fought to win points. Kent currently have a lead of 125 after rolling championship chasing Hants out for 57, 3 days after winning the RL cup!

Somerset looked out of it earlier in the season but were the better team against us and are looking like they are building towards a decent 1st innings.

Kent play Somerset last game and we will certainly lose to Hants, making them look superb in the process. We can't say that this was not coming, there have been enough posters on here warning about things not being right all season.

Gloucs have a bowler called Dale-Singh

Cant say that I have seen him before but I think he is currently in some kind of competition to see how poorly you can bowl and still take a wicket!

He is dreadful: short, leg side, wide long hop and all in one over!

150/6 against this lot is a poor effort so far.

Looking as though we will not gain any batting points, which are crucial to us for survival.

There is not much difference between our score & Kent's now, pretty poor when you compare Hampshire's attack to this woeful Gloucs team's.

It does not seem to matter how poor the opposition, we find ways of making them look very good.

Terrible shot by Rhodes there. Wide garbage and he half chased it.

How frustrating are we? We have just put together a really good few overs, scoring well and looking well set and then we give it up softly.

3 down now with Hain gone.

We are up against it here, fortunately Kent are hungover and completely under the cosh against Hampshire.

Good point, silly all the same.

Match drawn, Gloucs now a must win.

What a ridiculous run from Yadav...........what the hell was he thinking?

Whether it was out or not that was suicidal!!

That looked a shocking decision on Burgess

Borderline dissent from him standing there for so long pointing at his bat suggests that he got a decent nick on that delivery.

I make it something like 20 overs to bat out for the draw

I have to say that I am very surprised by Somerset's approach in the last couple of hours.

Even with our crab like approach to run rates they cannot declare on anything that would be even close to a total that is achievable, losing the game for them is unthinkable but they should already be at a point where they are thinking of putting us in 1st thing.

A lead of 286 is not enough to declare on (although we will never get that many) with what is at risk when a draw keeps them ahead of us but with wickets in hand they really should be 40 runs ahead of that total.

This is going to be the best day to bat, despite the low scoring rate (which Rhodes & Briggs are taking care of) Somerset will find the runs as long as they keep wickets intact.

Tomorrow is a cloudier day and with our top 3 the middle order will soon be well up against it, this game is Somerset's to lose.

Poor stuff from Siraj this morning despite getting his 5th wicket early.

He is spraying it all over the place rather than bowling wicket to wicket (Brookes has done this and just cleaned them up as I type)

Somerset have gained a good 40/50 runs more than they should have plus a batting point.

Hopefully we can build an innings now.

Yep, good point on the OHD LBW.

That gets given and we probably roll them for 170.

We are in a good spot, just need to put our foot down tomorrow and stop them gaining a batting point.

This is frustrating now..........they should have been bowled out for 150ish

Gregory is an extremely average red ball batter and Khan is a genuine number 10 yet they both look as if they are in no trouble at all.

We cant seem to get more than one or two of our bowlers/batsmen working well in the same innings, god knows what has happened to Danny Briggs but Gregory rightly targeted him. OHD has been a little unlucky to be fair.

I hope these extra runs do not come back to bite us.

It looks as though that will be it for the day which seems a better outcome for us than Somerset at this stage.

We are just not good enough. Sibley, Yates, Lamb with the bat and Norwell & Rhodes with the ball have allowed this game to slip away........we cant blame the young kids but at the same time they had a 21yr old & an 18yr old who shared nearly 200 runs!!

Some of this bowling from Somerset is garbage but we cannot cope with it despite them not winning a one day game all season.

Somerset have been mostly blown away by the other teams attacks this season but we allowed them to build an innings that we cant compete with them.

What a depressing season this has been, pretty disgraceful stuff from all but Hain, OHD & Burgess.

Surely there must be some changes to personnel after this?

paulbear wrote:

100-4 is poor if you consider what is to come after. A lot depends on the skipper. Leicestershire are 68-6 and so victory takes us through if they lose but the feeling at moment is that Somerset who have done *** all so far in tis competition are going to put and end to our one-day season.

Goldsworthy is bowling some of the worst tripe I have ever seen and yet he takes 2 wickets, Harding is also dreadful but we find ourselves 4 down............0 wins in 7 matches for Somerset btw

Mikkyk wrote:

If you could 'only' make three changes for next season Measham, what would they be? (I've got a few more than three in mind!)

Only just logged back in so apologies for not responding sooner.

1. The opening pair/alternatives to it rather than sticking with Davies & Sibley no matter what (personally I think we should have put Sibley on gardening leave for at least the one day games once he announced he was leaving). It has meant that out middle order has been under pressure all season and in all competitions.
2. A reliable fast medium partner for OHD. The club cant be blamed for Briggs form but we took a punt on Miles & Norwood who both maxed out last season and Rhodes is not a front line bowler. We have responded by bringing in an Indian international but is it too late?
3. A thought out plan of personnel to play across 3 formats and including the loss of players to the hundred. Some players have not been given enough of a chance and some (Davies in particular) have been given too many chances, costing us heavily.

Garratt, Johal & E Brookes should be getting game time by now they are 20, 21 & 22 yrs old now but undercooked. Other counties would have given them lots more game time allowing the coaches to make decisions on whether they are good enough or not.