Glos book themselves a home quarter final in the T20 Blast

T20 Blast: Glos beat Essex by 9 wickets.

Essex will beat a hasty retreat from Cheltenham after a weekend of being mauled by a young and hungry Gloucestershire team playing some fantastic cricket.

Another T20 match brought more runs for Maxy Klinger (again the competition's leading run scorer - 517 runs at 57). More runs for Ian Cockbain (the competitions second highest run scorer - 457 runs at 65). More wickets for Benny the bowler (the competition's leading wicket taker - 20 wickets at 15). And most importantly, this particular win brings a guaranteed home quarter final at the start of August.

Batting first Glos got away to a good start with O'Mish delivering 43 runs from 28 balls to set a platform for Maxy and Cockbain to go to work. The impressive thing about these two has not only been the consistency, but the composure and ease they have with their own games. We have witnessed this throughout Maxy's time with the Shire. He has absolutely confidence in his own game to just ease up through the gears and to press the accelerate when needed, and not before.

This influence has very clearly rubbed off on Ian Cockbain. Cockbain is a player who until this season clearly saw himself as a bit of a biffer. A guy who hit a long ball. This season he has been the complete number 3, playing a variety of different styles of innings depending on what the game called for. His evolution has been extremely impressive and the Jessop Tavern is delighted for a player they have long been fans of.

Posting their highest total of the season, 212 for 1, Gloucestershire's bowlers then squeezed the life out of the Essex reply, taking important wickets at the right time, and never allowing the Essex run chase to even get started. Matt Taylor continued his fine form with 2 for 25. Benny the bowler continued his economic wicket taking with 3 for 27, and that was about that.

Gloucestershire are now 4 points top of the group with only one game remaining and are assured of a home quarter final. The Jessop Tavern is already looking into travel to Edgbaston.

Video highlights:

Division three table toppers

Day 4: Glos 409 for 5 dec v Essex 353 for 6




Only 51 overs were possible on the final day of play at Chelmsford as Gloucestershire's opening match of the 2013 season petered out into a draw. Tom Westley went on to complete his hundred after a let off from older Gidders in the second over of the day. Gloucestershire thus had to settle for 9 points and a highly encouraging start to the season, and certainly better than last year's debacle in the opening round of fixtures.

Scoring over 400 after being put in speaks for itself, and heres to hoping that the batting continues to produce the runs that, on paper, it really should be producing. The bowling on the other hand; well, it's hard to read too much into things. Fuller looked dangerous with the new ball, but it must be a slight concern that both Norwell and Payne went round the park a bit. Still, it's early days, and both of these bowlers have shown enough over the last few seasons to mean this isn't too much of a concern.

After the match Essex coach Paul Grayson made the point that he was happy with the squad he had assembled at Essex for this campaign. Added to the team for this match can be international cricketers such as Owais Shah, Ryan ten Doeschate and Saj Mahmood along with promising youngster Reece Topley. This perhaps emphasis' exactly how tough things will be for Glos this season. Paul Grayson's quote perhaps sums up the challenge best,

"If you achieve things it's not down to 11, 12 players, it's down to 15, 16. We might have to use a rotation system at some time, if guys are a bit tired we might be able to rest one or two at certain periods, especially with one-day cricket. But I'm pleased with the way the squad is shaping up."


So who are Gloucestershire's 15 or 16? Of the squad members who could be added to the XI that played here only Ian Saxelby would walk straight in. Ian Cockbain represents decent batting cover, but the only other players who might be considered are the two spinners, Jack Taylor and Ed Young. It's a painfully thin squad, and represents the difficulties Glos face this season.

We also enjoyed Alex Winter's creation of the new county championship division 3 in his match report.

"Realistically, they are part of an unofficial Division Three with Glamorgan, Northamptonshire and Leicestershire. Bettering those three sides this season would be a start but Klinger will have seen enough talent on show in the opening game to suggest Gloucestershire can secure a mid-table finish."

Excellent! After round one of matches, Glos sit proudly atop the newly formed division three.

Musings on what could have been

Days 2 and 3: Glos 409 for 5 dec v Essex 177 for 3.






The weather and a stubborn knock from Tom Westley have surely put pay to any thoughts Gloucestershire had of starting the 2013 campaign with a win. Despite James Fuller's early salvo of 2 for 22 from 4 overs at the end of day 2, play only resumed again at 3pm on day 3 and Tom Westley and former Gloucestershire star (!) Ravi Bopara shut the door firmly in Gloucester's face with a stand off 116.

James Fuller's efforts on the evening of day two confirmed last seasons impression that Fuller is a real wicket taking bowler. Without having seen too much of him it is difficult to know whether this wicket taking ability comes from genuinely good deliveries, or whether he sprays the ball around so much that batsmen are drawn into daft dismissals. We've all played against these sort of guys. They run in at a hundred miles and hour and terrify the life out of you, not because of their quality, but because you know that they have absolutely no control over where the ball is going. The ball is as likely to be fired directly at your head, as fired 6 feet down the leg side, or ripping out your off stump. We are not suggesting Fuller doesn't have quality, but his previous misnomers for beamers suggests he has something of the maverick operator about him.

Rolling back to day two, O'Mish and Housego both moved their scores to 149 and 150 respectively, and Benny Howell gave the scoreboard the acceleration it needed in posting a declaration. Howell is an interesting selection. Last season he appeared far more comfortable in the shorter form of the game, and his innings here seems to confirm this. When he walks in with the score on 351, as he did here, you feel he is more suited than facing down a crisis. Still, a little bit of competition between him and Ian Cockbain can only be a good thing.

Listening to BBC Essex's coverage on day one the point was made about the how much worth there is in playing for a draw in division 2. With no relegation and with only three points differential between a loss and a draw, how much do you really gain from drawing a match. Contriving results is hardly a new thing in county cricket, but usually these things happen towards the end of the season. Looking at the weather forecast for the final day it seems unlikely that there will be enough play to manufacture a result anyway, but it would interesting to see how each team view the possibility of creating a result so early in the season.

Finally, as always Alex Winter's match reports for this game have been excellent, and well worth checking out. Today he makes the point about the high turn over of youngsters that Essex have had to endure over the last few seasons. Varun Chopra, Chris Wright, Tony Palladino and Adam Wheater have all left over the past few years. That's quite a useful group of players. Of course this is always likely to be a problem for counties who, like Essex have struggled, during this time period. However, it did make us think again about the Gloucestershire youngsters and how much interest their has been in them over the winter. Did any of the bigger counties enquiry about Chris Dent or James Fuller, and if not, what does this say about the quality of these guys? It's a theme that the Jessop Tavern View has touched upon before. Time will tell exactly how good these kids can become. After such a positive start to the season, our glass is a lot closer to half full.

Fire up the promotion bandwagon

Day1: Glos 300 for 3 (Housego 124*, Marshall 120*)




Somebody get on the phone to the builders at Nevil Road and tell them we're going to need a bigger trophy room. It's 2013 and the Shire's youngsters are heading for fame and glory. Promotion is as good as done and the only question is exactly how many double decker buses the boys need for the victory parade.

Removing the hyperbole; Gloucestershire started the 2013 season in frankly extraordinary fashion. Put in to bat by Essex the boys got off to a solid enough start before three wickets fell before lunch leaving Glos delicately poised at 71 for 3. Dan Housego, who endured something of a working over by veteran chugger David Masters when he first arrived at the crease, then proceeded to steady the ship with an innings of tremendous responsibility and poise. Hamish O'Marshall, coming in at what looks a more comfortable number 5 position added the acceleration and Gloucestershire's 2013 campaign was off and running.

O'Marshall hundreds are something like London buses. You wait three years for one, and then two come along....in successive seasons! More tellingly, Gloucestershire scored only 7 hundreds between them last season. After day 1 of the new season they already have two. O'Marshall, like older Gidders, has too much quality not to be scoring big runs regularly in division two and let's hope this is the start of a big season for the wee Irish man. Dan Housego, on the other hand, showed glimpses of quality last season, but never really put together a run of scores. Let's similarly hope that this is the start of his breakthrough year.

Essex went for the quick pairing of Maurice Chambers and Tymal Mills, neither of whom managed to impress the BBC Essex crew. New signing Saj Mahmood didn't make the cut after apparently being overbowled in pre-season. You really do know you've fallen a long way if you go from being an England sprayer to someone who was so overbowled in pre-season that they still got sent away to turn their arm over for the second XI. Exactly why England Lion Reece Topley isn't playing we can't tell you. Until Glos have a bowl its hard to tell precisely how poorly Essex bowled. You'd like to think that in early April Gloucestershire's seamers would find something more than the Essex attack managed.

Glos v Essex: Let the games begin....

New season. Same useless Gloucestershire website.

Gloucestershire take on Essex today in the first day of the 2013 season. Unsurprisingly Gloucestershire name an all seam attack, with Jack Taylor being let out.

More surprising is the debut of 18 year old wicket keeper Cameron Herring. Naturally there is no official word on this decision. Nor, is there much information regarding young Cameron's potential. Regular readers of this blog will not be surprised.

Ian Cockbain has also been left out, with Benny Howell filling the 6th batsman spot. Again, no explanation. Considering that Cockbain demonstrated genuine potential last season this is another surprising omission.

Presumably these decisions will be explained by the club.......oh, if only.

If anyone feels so inclined, please feel free to tweet the officially Glos twitter account (@Gloscricket) and ask them about these selectorial decisions. Just don't hold your breath for an answer.