There’s a first for me tonight, even after all this time. I haven’t written a blog about Derbyshire while sitting looking out at the ground from my hotel room! I paid a little extra for the privilege, but consider it money well spent.
That comes after a journey down that was much less fun and took me six hours, with roadworks and closures a-plenty. I have made a mental note to do next month’s Chesterfield trip by train, which takes just four hours and should leave me less tired at the end of it.
Anyway, Mickey Arthur has named a squad of fifteen for the game that starts tomorrow against Northamptonshire. Mitch Wagstaff is in there, but there is no place for second team century makers Amrit Basra and Yusuf Bin Naeem. I honestly can’t call a final eleven here, but I assume Nick Potts is in to encourage additional efforts after a good display at Belper. I find it hard to believe Nye Donald will play either, since he has been water and helmet carrier for the last two matches and hasn’t had much time in the middle himself.
Squad:
Wayne Madsen, Harry Came, Martin Andersson, Luis Reece, Nye Donald, Shoaib Bashir, Ben Aitchison, Jack Morley, Matthew Montgomery,
Mitch Wagstaff, Caleb Jewell, Nick Potts, Brooke Guest, Zak Chappell, Rory Haydon
So my best guess is that the side will be largely unchanged. I would like to think Mitch Wagstaff might get an opportunity, but he might have preferred a lesser challenge than Ben Sanderson, a very canny bowler and Harry Conway, who has run in hard for them this summer. He never gets easy opportunities, does Mitch, but I hope he gets it tomorrow and even more so I hope he takes it.
The visitors are currently second in the table, after the demolition job that they did on Worcestershire. Sanderson took 7-31 in that one and it will be interesting to see if the Derbyshire batting lineup has had its confidence restored, because they will be tested here.
Their squad:
Luke Procter (c), George Bartlett, Justin Broad, Harry Conway, Calvin Harrison, Louis Kimber, Lewis McManus (wk), Nathan McSweeney, James Sales, Ben Sanderson, George Scrimshaw, Ricardo Vasconcelos, Saif Zaib
The forecast is decent for the game, although rain is likely both tomorrow and Saturday afternoons. It depends which way the wind blows and we can only hope that Derbyshire show at least a return to form after three straight losses.
I can’t forecast a win, because it’s at Derby and you can’t, in our current run of form.
I just hope the next three days sees good players performing at their best and if it isn’t enough, so be it.