Back in the habit of mediocrity

Day 2; Glos 112 v Surrey 626 - 6.

The Jessop Tavern View has always been more comfortable with abject failure. Both from a personal perspective when on a cricket field and while supporting Gloucestershire for over two decades; it's fair to say we have had a fair few of these sort of days. Thus it is with some relish that we can empty out our half full glass and enjoy the comfortable feeling of, well, being Gloucestershire we guess.

When Isaac Newton wrote about momentum he didn't really have county cricket in mind. Still, had Newton ever had to watch Gloucestershire he might have ripped up his laws of physics and decided what's the point. Mass x Velocity means nothing to the Shire. Despite a phenomenal performance against Leicestershire being backed up with some very good cricket in the t20 Glos have produced an absolutely humdinger of a stinker in this match to bring us all crashing back down to earth.

It is now fairly safe to say that the Bristol pitch really wasn't a 112 all out in the first innings sort of pitch. With a team missing Will Tavare's enormous experience (7 proper first class matches) and Chris Dent's runs (224 at an average of 20) Gloucestershire's batsmen ripped up the form book and collapsed in our themselves in impressive fashion. It would have been one thing to have been blown away by a rejuvenated Chris Tremlett giving the middle of the pitch a thorough test. Or by Jade Dernbach bamboozling us with an assortment of back of the hand deliveries- with batsmen surprised that Dernbach actually even knows he is supposed to be bowling at the three sticks at the other end. But no. Gloucestershire managed to allow Jason Roy to blitz them. Admittedly, the Shire were already in the mire by the point Roy was thrown the ball, but still. Jason Roy had 6 first class wickets before yesterday. Gloucestershire allowed him to end up with figures of 3 for 9. Shameful.

At the start of the season, even with Saxelby, Miles, Fuller and Payne, Gloucestershire's bowling looked a little bit pop gun. Now shorn of all 4 of those players due to injury, the boys struggled to even muster the venom of a pop gun in response to being bowled out for 112.

By all accounts the boys actually bowled alright on a placid pitch, and certainly no one's figures are too disgraceful. In further defence of the bowlers they have also held up reasonably well this season. The Jessop Tavern certainly feared that days like today might be more frequent than they have been. So let's just put this match to one side and move on. Arguably the best thing the boys could do would be to roll over tomorrow and have a day off on Thursday.