"Yes, it felt like a game that would win a Championship. Ironically, the previous game had felt like one in which you chuck a Championship away"
Aigburth, scene of Notts' thrilling win over Lancs. image: Scott Oliver
It felt like the sort of game that decides a Championship. Whenever you require Harry Gurney to smoke a ball through the covers to secure a victory – standing straight and tall, and swinging the bat through a smooth arc, it was a stroke of which Greg Chappell would have been proud (Greg, not Glen: he was bowling) – you know the bums are in urgent need of some WD40.
It probably shouldn’t have been so tight – the game, that is. In the third innings of the match, Lancashire were nine down for 169, a lead of just 134, but Kabir Ali and Stephen Parry (a replacement for Simon Kerrigan, called into the England squad) nudged them up to 205, leaving Notts requiring 170 to win to keep their noses in front in the title race. They were important runs, but Notts would still have felt content with their afternoon’s work since at one stage, with Test-playing left-handers Usman Khawaja – a name which lends itself to his adopted homeland, Australia, in the same way that Jerzy Dudek suited Scouse – and Ashwell Prince in tandem, they were 99 for 2 and building well. Then, two improving cricketers, Harry Gurney and Luke Fletcher, intervened with spells of 4 for 22 and 3 for 33 respectively. The chase would be ticklish, but Notts’d be strong favourites.
Former Lancs man Steve Mullaney looked in good nick after Hales had fallen to the evergreen Glen Chapple, surely the fastest forty-year-old in world cricket. However, when he played all round a straight one from Tom Smith, and Michael Lumb and James Taylor fell to the same bowler, our heroes were 50 for 4 and looking in a spot of bother. Two instinctively aggressive middle-order men, Samit Patel and Riki Wessels, counter-attacked studiously, making useful 20s, yet both got out to loose, almost flaky shots before Peter Siddle, on his farewell appearance for the county, was bounced out. 119 for 7. Notts’ skipper, Chris Read, would have to steer the ship around the Horn of Africa and its Somali pirates with only the company of Bulwell behemoth Fletcher, the ageless Andre Adams, and Gurney.
Peter Siddle lurks at fine-leg. image: Scott Oliver
While Read defended watchfully, pouncing on anything short, Fletcher was a picture of calm orthodoxy, lining the ball up well, remaining composed as Chapple came round the wicket to bowl some ‘bodyline’ (and knowing of Fletch’s irritation that every match report seems to make mention of his heft, I’ll resist the temptation to suggest that Chapple might have been thinking it was a big target). Anyway, for 63 balls Fletch resisted everything until, with 7 runs required, he nicked Kabir Ali to third slip. He looked crestfallen, and trudge off at a pace that made Inzamam-ul-Haq look like an Olympic 50km walker.
In came Andre Adams, a man who’s never going to die wondering. He had a relatively lengthy bedding-in period – two deliveries – then smeared his third ball through wide mid on for four. The three slips conferred and pointed, doubtless saying how it was obvious to have a man there. Three to win, and Ali was running in again. Another hard swing, if anything even wilder – what on earth had Chris Read said (or not said) to him – steepled the ball over the slips and just out of reach of a converging wicket-keeper and third man. Two runs. Scores level. Game safe. Points in the bag. Well done Notts. But then Kabir Ali decided he’d use the final ball of his over by sending down a bumper to Andre, who again kitchen-sinked his shot, a hook, picking out Stephen Parry on the long long-leg boundary. Oh Andre – play t’situation, just this once!
No problem, though, because Chris Read, 40 not out, would be on strike. Well, unless he somehow managed, inexplicably, to cross with Adams as the ball was en route to Parry. Gah. Suddenly, the tie was on. Suddenly, Gurney was in the firing line. Suddenly you’re seeing me, just the way I am, thought Harry G, a bona fide No12, as Glen Ghapple came in once more. The tie was favourite. But they’d reckoned without Harry’s cover drive. The balcony at this quaint old Victorian ground in Liverpool’s south-eastern suburbs erupted with jubilant Notts players. This meant a lot to them. Yes, it felt like a game that would win a Championship. Ironically, the previous game had felt like one in which you chuck a Championship away…
darkening skies at Edgbaston. image: Scott Oliver
Notts’ visit to Edgbaston to play Warwickshire was a game they should have cruised, strolled, cantered – and any other form of leisurely gait you care to mention (not trot, though). Three times they held an apparently decisive advantage; three times they frittered it away. In the first innings, on the back of Alex Hales’ 183, they had reached 396 for 5, yet lost their last five wickets for just 10 runs. When it was Warwickshire’s turn to bat, Notts had them in deep trouble at 125 for 5 and 227 for 8, only for No10 Chris Wright to make a sprightly 65 in partnership with the excellent Chris Woakes, who made a solid 91, but his biggest contribution was still to come.
On a pitch that was still flat, Warwickshire’s first innings total of 343 would mean that they’d have to restrict Notts to an overall lead of around 300 to have a chance. This looked far from likely when the visitors reached 119 for 2 (effectively 182 for 2), their third apparently impregnable position of the game. But a fine spell of reverse-swing from Woakes (5 for 35), well supported by Jeetan Patel (3 for 24), with Boyd Rankin picking up the vital wicket of Phil Jaques, who added 79 to his first dig 77 on his farewell appearance, left the Bears a target of 289. Despite slipping to 64 for 3, the pitch was too flat, Notts lacked a frontline spinner, perhaps even a bit of heart having squandered so many good positions, and Warwickshire knocked off in relative comfort.
The defeat in Birmingham could have derailed a weaker unit, and it is to Notts credit that they held it together in Liverpool. Just. They had come into that game having beaten Middlesex by themselves chasing down 380, as we covered in the last column, and by seeing off another Championship rival, Somerset, after that. Marcus Trescothick’s first innings 87 at least gave the Cidermen a total of 168, but Notts’ powerful batting lineup of Jaques (113), Mullaney (91), Patel (94), Wessels (76) and Hales (41) pushed the lead to just shy of 300. Despite a creditable 402 second time round, the victory target of 110 was passed with just three wickets lost. So, as the pink-ball, 50-over part of the season looms into view, Notts’ home clash against the team keeping them off the top of the Championship by just 6 points, Yorkshire, is already looking to be a humdinger…
nighttime quarter-finals at Trent Bridge: special
Meanwhile, Outlaws must finish off a T20 campaign that had started with the considerable wobble of three defeats in their first four home matches, before a strong recovery has secured safe passage to the quarter-finals. They smashed 206 in the local derby against, erm, Derbyshire, Riki Wessels top-scoring with 95 not out. An abandoned game at Worcester was followed by a narrow home victory over Yorkshire, skipper James Taylor’s 52 getting Notts to 143 before Luke Fletcher closed out the game. Another abandoned away game, in Durham, was followed by a nail-biter against Warwickshire Birmingham Bears, Fletcher’s uncannily accurate death-overs yorkers getting the job done. In a low-scoring affair on an increasingly tired looking Trent Bridge square, Leicestershire Foxes were swatted aside, despite Notts managing just 121. Reigning champions Northants were seen off by 22 runs last night, with Riki Wessels again to the fore, smoking 64 on his old patch.
Friday’s game in Leeds thus cements Notts’ position second in the North group, and it would take a heavy defeat and an equally resounding victory for Worcestershire to now deny them a home quarter-final. Mind you, given they’ve lost three home T20 quarter-finals on the spin – against Somerset, Hampshire and Essex – that might not be so desirable. Either way, they probably have a stronger starting XI now than at the start of the campaign, with Kiwi all-rounder James Franklin having come in for Sam Wood and Steve Mullaney dropping down to No 8. With Hales, Lumb, Wessels and Patel as the top four, they are a team most would hope to avoid.
As dictated by Sky TV, those quarter-finals will be spread across the first three days of August, a month that sees only one Championship fixture, back at Northampton. No, August is all about the Royal London 50-over competition (previously 40 overs), a trophy held by Notts after a comprehensive win over Glamorgan at Lord’s last September.
A repeat would be most welcome, but there’s no doubt Mick Newell will see the Championship as his bread and butter. He has lost his two Australians, Phil Jaques and Peter Siddle, so it’ll have to be the home-grown players – and Andre Adams – who do the business. The batting unit has looked solid all year. Can the bowling unit cope with the final strait?
We have a favour to ask
LeftLion is Nottingham’s meeting point for information about what’s going on in our city, from the established organisations to the grassroots. We want to keep what we do free to all to access, but increasingly we are relying on revenue from our readers to continue. Can you spare a few quid each month to support us?
