Day 1: Gloucestershire v Kent
It's a good job that the first day of play in the current Glos v Kent championship match was washed out as it has given the Jessop Tavern View time to recover.
Sitting down to write a match preview we went through the usual token gesture of looking at the official Gloucestershire website for any signs of a bit of team news. Now usually this is a very quick process that involves clicking on the website and seeing only news of last week's game and some lame attempt to sell us gym membership. This is quickly followed by us copying and pasting our usual rant about the piss-poor nature of the official site. But not this week. No, no, no.
A full day before the game was due to begin we receive news that Will Gidman will make a very welcome return for the first time since June. We also learn that '38' is back from a slight side strain. We'll skip over the fact that we never knew that Fuller was even injured in the first place. We'll also skip over the extensive match previews that Kent supporters get from their official website. If anyone wants to know why we complain so much about this issue then just follow the respective couple of links and compare. Embarrassing, isn't it?
Ian Saxelby has failed to shake off a knee injury, but David Payne is named in the squad despite picking up a niggle in last week's game against Hampshire.
Thankfully Paul Muchall is injured.
Inexplicably Jon Batty returns in place of Richard Coughtrie. Considering that we haven't seen Coughtrie keep wicket this season we can only presume that he is like Cymbals the Clown. Coughtrie averages a terrible 10, from seven championship appearances, but did bat for two hours for his 20 odd last week. Batty averages 13 and is out of contract at the end of the season. We can only presume that the wicket keeping position will be addressed over the winter, otherwise playing Batty ahead of Coughtrie makes absolutely no sense.
Despite Gloucestershire's championship campaign having died a death post the t20 break we still hope that the boys can continue to build on the potential they have shown at times this season.
One final thought. Captain Gidders is averaging 23 this season, from 11 championship matches. He has 397 runs. With three championship games remaining, all eyes will be on whether Alex can reach that magical 500.
A pair of long-suffering Gloucestershire County Cricket club fans attempt to put the world (and the Glos administration) to rights. Themes include: Is one England ODI a year a good model for financial success and ground redevelopments, whether a batting average of 35 in Division 2 of the County Championship is acceptable and why Glos continue to be rubbish.
It does look as if it has been decided Coughtrie is not up to it. And the same fate appears to be Ed Young’s. Shame. talented cricketers but they haven’t improved. As far as batting is concerned, they’ve gone backwards. But is this down to the individuals alone or should be expecting our coaching to do more for young players?
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