27-09-2016, 11:23
Yesterday I looked at Derbyshire's averages and they told an unusual tale of our failure. Historically Derbyshire produces bowlers, but the averages show how rooted our failure has been in bowling.
Our rivals all had three or four bowlers who had bowled from 290 to 400 + overs in the season. We had Palladino only at 450+ and Cotton our next most turned-to bowler had just 202. No other side had a return anything like that. And poor old Palladino wasn't that successful carrying the burden, as his wickets cost over 30 runs apiece. Every other team had a principal wicket-tacker with a better average. But bowlers need support.
To emphasise the problem we had eight bowlers who bowled between 100-199 overs in the season. Other teams tended to have only one or two turned to so occasionally.
We clearly don't know who are our best bowlers and never give anyone a chance to establish himself as front-line. Therefore it must be pretty impossible to come up with a plan of attack. Successful cricket teams tend to have a pattern to bowl to ....... we obviously don't. Even more disturbingly it would simply be impossible for us ever to develop a spin bowler if he could only expect such limited use. If the first time he concedes runs he's out of the team he just won't develop, true of any young bowler.
In the end it doesn't matter how many batsmen you find to average 45+ if you haven't got regular bowlers, taking wickets at County level you can never win matches ..... and we seem to have provided the perfect proof.
Our rivals all had three or four bowlers who had bowled from 290 to 400 + overs in the season. We had Palladino only at 450+ and Cotton our next most turned-to bowler had just 202. No other side had a return anything like that. And poor old Palladino wasn't that successful carrying the burden, as his wickets cost over 30 runs apiece. Every other team had a principal wicket-tacker with a better average. But bowlers need support.
To emphasise the problem we had eight bowlers who bowled between 100-199 overs in the season. Other teams tended to have only one or two turned to so occasionally.
We clearly don't know who are our best bowlers and never give anyone a chance to establish himself as front-line. Therefore it must be pretty impossible to come up with a plan of attack. Successful cricket teams tend to have a pattern to bowl to ....... we obviously don't. Even more disturbingly it would simply be impossible for us ever to develop a spin bowler if he could only expect such limited use. If the first time he concedes runs he's out of the team he just won't develop, true of any young bowler.
In the end it doesn't matter how many batsmen you find to average 45+ if you haven't got regular bowlers, taking wickets at County level you can never win matches ..... and we seem to have provided the perfect proof.