Glos embroiled in disgraceful sex scandal

With the recent 'allegations' regarding various stars of yesteryear's sexual behaviour it seems fitting that Gloucestershire should suddenly be plunged into it's own sleazy story of sex-fuelled indiscipline.

King John put it on the record last week that Ian 'Shagger' Cockbain wasn't selected for last week's run-fest against Glamorgan due to a lack of 'red ball' form. This is pretty much as good as a written statement that Cockbain has been sleeping with King John's wife, and potential others. How do we know this? Well, just read behind the lines. Dropped for lack of 'red ball' form. Please. Since when has any Gloucestershire player ever been dropped on form. Hamish Marshall went 3 years without a hundred! How did Mark Hardinges play at all.* Lets not even get started on Carl Greenidge, it's just too painful. Form is a word that has never had to be taken into consideration at Nevil Road selection meetings. Whilst we always hear talk of how out of form England players 'look good in the nets', Gloucestershire can't even try to claim this. Players are described as having potential, or having looked good in 2006. Form is never considered. It's also better this way. If we only picked players on form we'd be fielding half a team by the end of the season.

*incidentally, Mark Hardinges scored 4 hundreds in 49 first class matches for Glos. Hamish O'Marshall has scored 3 hundreds in 63 matches since the end of 2008 for Glos. Alex Gidman has 3 hundreds in 50 matches since the end of 2009. Hardinges also took 95 wickets. Just saying.*

So there we have it. Shagger Cockbain can only be trusted for one day cricket. Presumably keeping his libido checked over the course of 4 days is just too difficult.

In fairness, Cockbain is averaging only 15 in the second XI this season. In fairness he has only played 2 and a half second XI games.

Make up your own minds.

Given the lack of young batting talent that seems to be coming through the ranks it would be a shame if Cockbain were forced to go elsewhere to get first class cricket next season. 

Glos and Glamorgan demonstrate collective lack of ambition

Day 3 and 4: Gloucestershire 478 v Glamorgan 448 and 176 for 2.

So, what was the point of that?


Gloucestershire and Glamorgan played out an incredibly tedious draw that does absolutely nothing for either side. Gloucestershire take away 8 points, Glamorgan 7. According to captain Klinger, Glos were looking to build a lead of around 130 on the final morning before hoping that Glamorgan might feel a little bit of pressure when all they could hope for was to bat out the draw. Instead Gloucestershire crumbled to Michael Hogan, who took 5-13 in 26 balls to finish with 7-92, thus proving that it was possible to take bunches of wickets on an incredibly benign Bristol pitch.

We understand that wickets only fell because Glos were trying to score quickly, which is exactly what they would have had to do had they allowed Glamorgan to set a final day total. We also realise that Glamorgan probably wouldn't have had the bottle to set a chaseable total on such a flat pitch.

This reflects badly on both sides. Had this been further towards the end of the season then the liklihood is that a result would have been attempted to be contrived. But what is the point of not doing it now? At least give yourself the opportunity to get in the mix at the top half of the table. As we frequently point out, the difference between a draw and a loss is 3 points, plus there is no relegation, so nothing to fear from the wooden spoon.

Anyway......

Klinger and Gidders continued their good form. Both of these guys should now be eyeing up at least 1000 runs for the season. The House also got some runs on the board and Gareth Roderick continued to look the part as a genuine wicketkeeper-batsman. Craig Miles also helped himself to another 5 wicket haul.

Other than that this game is now cast aside as instantly forgettable.

Day 3 Highlights:



Day 4 Highlights:

Is it asking for trouble to start talking about declarations?

Day 2: Glamorgan 448 v Gloucestershire 179 - 1.

 

About the only intriguing thing to come from day 2 of this match was the will-they, won't-they intrigue of whether Glos will invite Glamorgan to set a target for Gloucestershire to chase when day 4 finally rolls around.

Admittedly there is a fair amount of cricket still to be played until those options are seriously considered, but with the pitch looking like it was dug up and dropped in from the M5 we are fairly confident that Glos will be able to bat through to the middle of the afternoon without collapsing. Should they bat till an hour after lunch they should be somewhere around 300-350. A declaration would then allow Glamorgan to setup Glos with a total of around 300 to chase on the final day.

Given that both sides currently reside in the bottom half of division 2 a draw is of no use to either side. It would be an incredibly negative move if either team refused this scenario.

Gloucestershire would surely fancy this opportunity. If the pitch continues to be as benign, and the sun continues to shine then Klinger's men would start favourites at chasing down any total they do get set. With this in mind, it wouldn't surprise us if Glamorgan erred on the side of caution. Maybe they should phone Glenn Chapple and ask him for his advice on declaring in order to set up a run chase. Last week Chapple needlessly chose to bat on for an extra 6 overs on the final morning. By doing so he guaranteed Glos would never attempt to chase the total and the time he took out of the game proved crucial, as last man Liam Norwell only had to face one delivery to save the game.

Earlier in the day Craig Miles took his obligatory 5 for. Miles now has 25 wickets in 5 matches this season. not bad for an 18 year old. Whilst we suspect he is getting a few extra wickets because there is no one else really taking wickets in the Glos attack, you've still got to take the wickets. An attack with Miles and just one of Will Gidman and Ian Saxelby would suddenly look a lot more threatening. An attack with all 3 would be like mediocre cricketing nirvana.

Miles' efforts were not enough to prevent Murray Goodwin from notching his 68th first class hundred and first for Glamorgan. Goodwin has been a very fine player over the years, but at the age of 41 and considering he has struggled to hit the ball at all this season this does rather add to the belief that scoring runs against Gloucestershire is now very similar to scoring runs against the universities.

Fingers crossed that the batsmen pad their averages this morning.

Allenby and Goodwin make the most of Glos selectorial error

Day 1: Glamorgan 318 for 5 v Gloucestershire.


Gloucestershire's strange selection of 6 bowlers seems to have backfired pretty spectacularly as Glamorgan closed day one on a commanding 318 for 5.


If you select a team with only five recognised batsmen then we guess you are basically relying on being able to blow the opposite away with the ball and not have to worry too much about how many runs you're going to score. However, with the sun baking down and pitch flat you do have to wonder whether its a case of being a little bit too clever and not really just sticking to the basics.

Despite all this, the young Gloucester attack stuck to their task manfully. David Payne and Craig Miles both struck early with the new ball to have Glamorgan teetering on 85 for 4. Unfortunately Jim Allenby and Murray Goodwin then put on 185 for the fifth wicket. In this context we shouldn't be too critical of the decision to bowl first. Glos had the opportunity to roll Glamorgan over but just couldn't get the job done as the shine went off the ball. It was still the wrong decision to bowl first.

None of the bowlers disgraced themselves, and all 6 of them returned respectable figures. 17 year old off-spinner Miles Hammond bowled 20 wicketless overs that cost him 64 runs. Not bad for a man who spent the morning pretending to be sick to his mum so that he could blag the day off school in order to play in the match.

Glos are now right up against it in this match. They must finish Glamorgan off for less than 400 tomorrow to have even the remotest chance of getting anything from the game. With both Glamorgan and Gloucestershire occupying the lower middle table of division 2, this match represented a key moment in Gloucesters season. Win it, and you can look to consolidate a position in the middle of the pack. Lose, and suddenly you're spending the rest of the season fighting to avoid a second consecutive wooden spoon. Thus it is very disappointing to find ourselves with our backs against the wall in a key encounter due principally to some harebrained plan to pack the team with bowlers and let them have it.

We have pointed out on numerous occasions that only victories really count in division 2. A draw is as good as a defeat, and defeat comes without any repercussions in the form of relegation. Therefore you might as well set out your team to win the game. Packing the team with all these bowlers was clearly an attempt to win the match. We mustn't be critical of that. However, Gloucestershires coaching team can be criticised of perhaps having ideas above their station. It's a bit like the village team captain who insists on having two men back on the hook on a Sunday afternoon cos he's seen it on the telly, when in reality he has a team full of middle aged plodders who haven't got a ball above shin high for 20 years. It's all well and good to fill the team with bowlers if, a) your 5 bowlers have the quality and experience to blow teams away, and b) you have high quality batsmen who are capable of shouldering the burden of scoring all the runs. Gloucestershire have neither of these things.

Gloucestershire effectively chose to roll the dice with their selection. Unfortunately they rolled the dice needing to get two sevens and don't seem to have realised their mistake.

Shagger Cockbain left out of squad to face Glamorgan

Clearly Ian Cockbain must be shagging King John's wife, as frankly this can be the only explanation for him failing to make the 12 man squad for tomorrows county championship match against Glamorgan.

Gloucestershire have named only 6 batsmen, one of which is wicketkeeper Gareth Roderick who is playing only his third championship match and made a pair last time out.

The Jessop Tavern View had presumed that Cockbain would be a like-for-like replacement of Chris Dent who was injured in the YB40 victory against Yorkshire. Instead Glos elect to go into the game with 5 sprayers seamers, Fuller, Payne, Norwell, Miles and McCarter. Considering that Benny has taken 15 wickets at an average of 25, thus making him the team's second leading wicket taker, we are presuming that the groundsman at Bristol is stood out in the middle with a hosepipe as we speak.

Mysteriously, young Miles Hammond is also included in the squad. This contradicts King John's comments to the Bristol Evening Post that Hammond would only be available after the end of June because he was still in school. He had been available against Yorkshire because it is half term. Presumably the official website knows what it's talking about....!!

We should perhaps not leap to such a sordid conclusion that Cockbain can't keep it in his pants. Given that Glos have struggled to bowl teams out in the past two games perhaps a 7 man bowling attack is the way forward. Presuming that one of the seamers will miss out, Glos will still go into the match with 6 bowlers. Considering that Glamorgan's strength this year has probably been in the bowling of wily Australian Michael Hogan who has 27 wickets, second only to Gloucstershire destroyer Alan Richardson, this is probably even more of a surprise. Glamorgan do boast batsmen of the calibre of Marcus North and Murray Goodwin, but neither of these have hit the ball off the square yet this season. Only Jim Allenby has made an impression with the bat for a Glamorgan side who sit one place and nine points behind Gloucestershire.

Anyway, we're off to tell Ian Cockbain he needs to learn to bowl a bit of seam up and go at 5 an over, then he'll walk into the team.

Can we keep 40 over cricket?

The irony that Gloucestershire might finally be getting the hang of 40 over cricket in its final season of existence is not lost on us. When the domestic limited overs competition reverts back to 50 overs next season, the Jessop Tavern is already looking into the possibility that Glos might be able to translate their new-found competence in this format of the game by joining a local village 40 over league somewhere. We're still not sure if Ed Young would get any wickets though.

One man who certainly wouldn't look out of place playing on a village green would be Gloucestershires latest debutant, 17 year old off-spinner Miles Hammond.

Hammond has already represented England Under-19s, so clearly has something about him. However, with Jack Taylor currently suspended and Ed Young nursing a wrist injury, Hammond has suddenly become Gloucestershires frontline spinner. A bowling attack of Craig Miles (18) Graeme McCarter (20) and Hammond (17) is the sort of lineup that is more likely to have been associated with the Jimmy Saville enquiry than a first class cricket team.

Despite all of this, Glos produced a remarkably characterful performance against Yorkshire in chasing down a total of 241, only a day after grinding out a remarkable rearguard action in the championship draw with Lancashire.

Michael Klinger continued his fine form in this competition with a 98 ball 96. Klinger now has 264 runs at an average of 66 in the YB40 to go alongside his two hundreds in the longer form of the game. A recent (and also the very first) email sent to the Jessop Tavern (hello Martin; so you're the guy who reads this crap!) asked us what we made of Klinger. Whilst he's blown a little bit hot and cold in the championship, he is an opener and it is still the first part of the season. Not exactly prime time to be filling your boots at the top of the order. We reckon that these stats are a pretty decent return so far and he seems to have done a pretty good job marshaling the nursery school bowling attack.

Klinger also got good support from O'Mish and Gareth Roderick, who responded well to his pair in the Lancashire game. In fact the only downside is news that Chris Dent injured himself whilst fielding and is likely to miss this weeks championship game against Glamorgan. Presumably this will open the door for Ian Cockbain who has opened in the past. We like Cockbain a lot and would like to see Dent's place really threatened. Dent clearly has the talent but seems to be struggling to really stamp his authority on anything even close to a consistent basis.

If Cockbain can assert some pressure on Dent, and presumably Housego, then these early season injuries will suddenly have developed something approaching a fairly competitive and reasonably deep squad. At the start of the season we commented on how the squad looked painfully thin. With the emergence of Miles and McCarter with the ball, Roderick with the gloves and Benny doing a fairly passable Will Gidman impression, the squad suddenly does have some depth to it.

After yesterday's win Glos continue to sit on top of Group C, admittedly having played more games than anyone else. Still, considering the injuries we've had, to be still competitive is a fine enough achievement in itself. Well done boys.

Ed Young to the rescue

Gloucestershire 222 (Gidman 110, Kerrigan 5-68) and 173 for 9 drew with Lancashire 310 (Katich 96, Miles 6-88) and 270 (Prince 64, Croft 64, McCarter 4-95) 

The Jessop Tavern View admits it has some previous when it comes to Ed Young. We've frequently been critical of his 'bowling' and queried whether he is worth his place in the team, given his average of 70. The answer to this is 'no'. However, his brave resistance with the bat yesterday, batting for 6 odd overs despite a wrist injury sustained earlier in the match, proved he does have some value to the 'Shire.

Gloucestershire were set an unlikely 358 to win, after Lancashire extended their innings for a few overs at the start of the day, taking their lead to over 350. Once batting again, we swiftly lost Chris Dent, whose inability to stick around when circumstances require circumspection are a worrying trend. Given his obvious talent, King John should be having a word.

Corporal Klinger didn't last a lot longer, either, falling on the stroke of lunch to the handy Kerrigan. While he scored more than 10 today, he does already seem a rather binary player, lacking the consistent plundering which marks out a true Div 2 overseas mercenary. Housego didn't last much longer himself and it was thus left to old stagers, Gidders and O'Mish to bat for 29 overs while putting on 54. It was pleasing to see Gidman scores runs in the second innings, as given his first innings ton, we had predicted a single figure score second tine around. Once he departed, trapped LBW by non-overseas South African, Andrea Agathangelou, Benny Howell arrived and curbed his natural attacking instincts in another time-consuming partnership with Marshall. Hamish did surprisingly well in this knock, ultimately batting 204 balls for his 44.

Glos lost 4 late wickets to pile on the pressure, but McCarter and Young survived until the final over, leaving Liam Norwell to safely navigate the final delivery of the match. A creditable performance, given our mounting injury list among the bowling attack. 18 year old Craig Miles is looking more and more impressive with every match. We even heard rumours that the England Lions were running an eye over him. That's all we need, one of our few fit, decent quality bowlers getting called up. Yes, we know that's a parochial thing to say, but hey, we are proudly one-eyed west country folk here at the Jessop Tavern View.

A final word of credit must go to Glenn Chapple. 900 wickets is not an easy thing to come by and is testament to his skill, fitness and durability over a long career. His post-landmark comments were typically self-effacing and mostly focused on him just playing for a long time. However, to paraphrase 'Sir' Geoffrey Boycott, he must have bowled some good deliveries along the way, else all the batting was rubbish.

Video highlights from Day 4 below: