Deja vu all over again as Gloucestershire batting lets down bowling

Essex 385 (Westley 121, Cook 105, Shaw 4-118) and 94 for 0 (Browne 55*) beatGloucestershire 262 (Roderick 88*, Marshall 51, Porter 4-59) and 215 (Taylor 74, Roderick 58) by ten wickets 
Scorecard

A new season and a familiar refrain to regular readers of the blog. Why do Gloucestershire's batsmen consistently fail to produce the goods after making a start, thus putting our (in this match hugely inexperienced) bowling attack under pressure?

Let's cut to the chase. Gloucestershire don't have a very good championship bowling attack these days. After the departure of James Fuller, you would think the best 4 bowlers are Miles, Payne Norwell and Jack Taylor. Miles and Payne were both unfit to play in this match, which left us with debutants Josh Shaw and Tom Hampton (4 f/c wickets between them coming in) alongside Norwell. Former Sussex seamer Chris Liddle didn't make the XI, but you would think he would be in contention most weeks, unless Dawson is thinking of him as most a white ball option.

Benny and Gourmet Burger can fill in with overs of seam, but you wouldn't ideally want to have to play them both, simply to add up to one functioning all rounder. Especially given that Essex have a strong and deep batting lineup with the likes of Graham Napier coming in at 9.

All this is to emphasise the critical importance of the batsmen scoring first innings runs. You could argue that 262 was about par for the first game of the season away to a stronger side. However, if you look at the card lots of people got starts without going on. Roderick anchored the innings with an unbeaten 88. He is exempt from our criticism for sure. Chris Dent lived up to our expectations by looking great in scoring 27, before dragging on chasing a wide half volley. Ian Cockbain also looked in good nick, hitting 5 boundaries in his 24, before being well held by Cook at first slip off Porter.

O'Mish remains a favourite culprit. Despite his advancing years, the Irishman is clearly capable of scoring quantities of runs in D2. He managed a handy 51 in this game, before departing to a trademark loose shot which was snapped up by a diving Jesse Ryder at backward point. Howell departed second ball and Gourmet -Burger rarely looks of championship quality as a batsman- although admittedly it took another great team catch at slip to dismiss him for 5.

This left Jack Taylor and the skipper to try and rebuild. Jack knuckled down and managed a handy 39 before being bowled by Napier, who then dismissed Shaw and Norwell in consecutive balls. Ultimately this left the skipper stranded 12 short of a deserved ton.

We were treated to more of the same in the second innings, having bowled really well to restrict Essex to 385 from 224-2 at one stage. Cameron Bancroft and Cockbain departed caught behind in Porter's first over, bringing Roderick in at 0-2. An inability to construct meaningful partnerships seems a feature of Glos' batting, with only 45 between Roderick and Howell and 65 between the skipper and Taylor worthy of mention. Taylor hit out with freedom after Roderick's dismissal, ending on 74 with 5 sixes as he chased runs alongside 9-10-Jack who contributed 1 between them.

This left Essex the simple task of chasing 93 to win, which they did without fuss or loss of a wicket on the fourth morning. There is no shame in losing away to as strong a side as Essex, especially given that the England skipper scored a hundred for them. We bowled and fielded well (as is usually the case), although Essex definitely out-caught us if you watch the videos below.

We don't want to get too downhearted after one game where the side was missing key performers- at least with the ball. The worry is we simply don't have enough batting depth. You can add in Will Tavare and later, Klinger but what else do we have in reserve? Bancroft will doubtless improve (he was apparently sawn off in the second innings) and you would hope Dent and Cockbain can produce big runs reasonably consistently. But if not, it looks like a long, hard championship season is in prospect.

It's not all bad, mind. Glos welcome Derbyshire to Bristol for our first home game on Sunday. They're not all that good and there's no Martin Guptill to butcher us this year. Sid Payne is back in an otherwise unchanged squad. Fingers crossed for some improvement in front of the home faithful at Nevill Road.

Day 1 highlights

Day 2 highlights

Day 3 highlights

Day 4 highlights

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.