SURREY VS LANCASHIRE SPECSAVERS COUNTY CHAMPIONSHIP

First topic message reminder :

SURREY HAVE NAMED A UNCHANGED SQUAD FOR THE SECOND SPECSAVERS COUNTY CHAMPIONSHIP GAME OF THE SEASON, AGAINST LANCASHIRE AT THE KIA OVAL OVER EASTER WEEKEND.
FULL SURREY SQUAD
Gareth Batty (captain)
Zafar Ansari
Scott Borthwick
Rory Burns
Sam Curran
Tom Curran
Jade Dernbach
Ben Foakes (WK)
Mark Footitt
Stuart Meaker
Kumar Sangakkara
Dominic Sibley
Mark Stoneman
Never change a winning team I sure I read somewhere.
Over to you chaps

157-2 at lunch with a lead of 6 runs - 8 wickets remaining. Good session for Surrey, Borthwick and Sanga nearing at 100 partnership - hopefully guys like Sibley, Foakes, Zaf are all taking note and learning from a master, Sanga hasn't allowed the spinners to settle and bog him down and has been rewarded

Really need to bat this next session and a half out and it should be a draw

Excellent session only brain dead rocky ruined it

Rather good partnership between Borthwick and Sangakara....Surrey 8 runs ahead ...must be making for better viewing than an Ansari Sibley partnership....will only take a couple of wickets and pressure will be back on!

As Olly says, assuming we don't slow down to an absolute crawl if we bat another session and a half we'll be safe.

Glad that Borthwick's got a few and is still there. Hopefully, that'll help him settle in better.

Agree with the above - Sounds like Sanga has given a masterclass.

But even loss of one wicket could result in dramatic increase in pressure and tension - with likes of Sibley and Ansari likely to be badly lacking in confidence after first innings debacle. Also you would back Lancs to score at 10 an over to get pretty much any total we'd be likely to set. So it's bat and then bat some more. The new ball still very much in play (both for faster bowlers and spinners) - about 18 overs away, and there are still 60+ overs possible.

Borthwick reaches his first half century for Surrey.

50 for the goat

A very good pair of knocks in progress here. A lot of pressure on both when Stoneman fell but they have absorbed it well to put on a century partnership that is still growing.

Sanga is giving a lesson to a few of our batsman in the importance of tempo in an innings. Rather than dropping anchor he has pushed the scoreboard on, the more that lead grows the more pressure is relieved on from our top/middle order.

Partnership has lasted 43 overs so far - which is a fine effort. The batsmen have now rather gone into their shells, but minimum overs remaining now down to 45 - with lead at 54. Looking encouraging - and especially if these two can take us through to the new ball available in 10 overs time.

Btw there is a very fine photograph on the Surrey scorecard page of cricinfo of Ansari getting bowled by Kerrigan in the first innings.  It's the kind of picture to give a batsman nightmares!

150* partnership.

Sanga and Borthwick have batted exactly as required by the situation today. Fine effort.

Possibly a declaration at 4.50 with the captains shaking hands on the draw, allowing Chichester to get back to his allotment.

100 for the GOAT

guildfordbat wrote:Sanga and Borthwick have batted exactly as required by the situation today. Fine effort.

Possibly a declaration at 4.50 with the captains shaking hands on the draw, allowing Chichester to get back to his allotment.

Nice one GB! Beginning to wonder if I was a bit too hasty in writing today off as not one for the spectators...watching Sangakara bat, whatever the situation would have been a privilege...great to see Borthwick doing well too....However, there is a bit of a drought on in these parts....the allotment is calling, and I couldn't take the risk of having to sit through an Ansari / Sibley partnership! Or maybe that is a bit harsh on them both...at some point they are going to have to bat themselves into form! Btw...the BBC website is showing Lancs as having 8 points and Surrey 4....Is that right? I thought it should have been Six?

100 for Sanga   Very fine innings from the old master! Partnership so far lasted 52 overs. New ball due in two overs, lead up to 100 and minimum overs down to 37.  Should be OK as long as we don't lose our head!

Corporalhumblebucket wrote:Btw there is a very fine photograph on the Surrey scorecard page of cricinfo of Ansari getting bowled by Kerrigan in the first innings.  It's the kind of picture to give a batsman nightmares!

http://www.espncricinfo.com/county-cricket-2017/content/image/1092635.html?object=349853;dir=next

Excellent photo isn't, Corporal.

A good old fashioned, "played down Piccadilly and it went down Bakerloo".

Meanwhile... Cricinfo declares its "Stumps" in Surrey's match. Seems a bit premature at 1540!

They have now changed that to "tea".  Excellent session for Surrey.  Sanity has been restored!

chichestersurryfan wrote:

guildfordbat wrote:Sanga and Borthwick have batted exactly as required by the situation today. Fine effort.

Possibly a declaration at 4.50 with the captains shaking hands on the draw, allowing Chichester to get back to his allotment.

Nice one GB! Beginning to wonder if I was a bit too hasty in writing today off as not one for the spectators...watching Sangakara bat, whatever the situation would have been a privilege...great to see Borthwick doing well too....However, there is a bit of a drought on in these parts....the allotment is calling, and I couldn't take the risk of having to sit through an Ansari / Sibley partnership! Or maybe that is a bit harsh on them both...at some point they are going to have to bat themselves into form!  Btw...the BBC website is showing Lancs as having 8 points and Surrey 4....Is that right? I thought it should have been Six?

Hi Chichester - I'm sure you're right about the BBC goofing. In their respective 110 overs in which a side can get bonus points, Lancs scored 380 odd (4 pts) and took 8 Surrey wickets (2 pts). We took 6 or 7 wickets (2pts) and scored over 250 but less than 300 (2 pts). Thus, 6 to Lancs and 4 to us.

First Surrey hundred for Scott Borthwick - an excellent partnership and day for Surrey is this

250 run partnership

And Sanga is bowled for 136 off 190 balls - wonderful innings

Good Golly I'm Olly wrote:And Sanga is bowled for 136 off 190 balls - wonderful innings

Indeed.

Draw 99% guaranteed but Sibley's place isn't. He needs to finish today with a SR of at least 40 in red ink.

That's it!

Sibley sees out 5 dot balls from Kerrigan, Borthers allows Hameed a maiden to finish the game and Chichester heads for the allotment.

Our day but a very mixed Surrey performance.

Excellent batting display today - all four of our top order have now scored some serious runs in the opening tw cc matches.  Big questions about the middle order. One assumes that for the foreseeable future opposition captain will immediately bring on spinners every time Sibley comes out to bat!

We remain top of the table (32 points) but only five points separate the top four sides. Table makes uncomfortable reading for Warks who, in two matches, have collected just three points (all for bowling).

Allotment update...plot successfully watered! What a curious game.....Surrey dominating the first 2 and last 2 sessions.....and LANs comfortably winning pretty much the other 7... the phrase 'curates egg' pretty much sums up our performance but well done to Borthwick and the majestic Kangakarw today...People will more knowledge than me...are their any obvious replacements in the second team for Sibley to come in? Or will we stick with him?

Chichester - Harinath is the reserve batsman, but I'd reckon Sibley gets at least another game to get some runs on the board.

Hi Chichester - whist we have loads of bowling reserves, there's not so much in the batting cupboard. The main man missing is Jason Roy; however even when he's back from the IPL, he'll first be on England ODI duty. Ones who could in now are Arun 'The Baron' Harinath and young wicket keeper / batsman Olly Pope who both made runs for the seconds last week.

I would be tempted to recall Harinath but expect Sibley to be given another go.

Edit. PS James - our posts crossed. Case of great minds think alike ... or fools seldom differ!

thanks everyone for their thoughts about Surrey's middle order... generally I am in favour of giving people a decent run in a team and not chopping and changing... and clearly Sibley has ability... I suppose it is more about his temperament and his ability to change his game depending on the given situation in a match.. Anyway I wish him well and hopefully some valuable experience gained and learnt from this match..Incidentally the BBC website last time I checked was showing Lancs having gained 13 points from the match and Surrey 9... thank you GB for confirming what I'd thought that it should in fact be 11 and 9 to Surrey.... great to see we are still top of the table! I know it is early days and certainly not expecting us necessarily to remain there... but all in all, plenty to be positive about, except our middle order batting!

I'd imagine Sibley gets a game on Friday ahead of the Baron - who I see as more of the reserve opening bat (with Pope reserve middle order).

The frustrating thing with Sibley is that he's shown in the T20 stuff he can play attacking shots to great effect, and whilst obviously I'm not asking him to bat like he does in T20's, I think he needs to have a little more confidence in his ability and take a few risks to spread the field to allow him to nudge and nurdle. Foakes, whilst position not under threat, could also do with a decent score in the next game (another intriguing aspect for me was him coming in at #6 ahead of Ansari - was that purely situational?)

Hopefully we return to the formula that worked well against Warwickshire last time next time out - and I'd like to see Meaker come into the side personally (for either Batty or Ansari - likely Zaf)

Never in any doubt

I'd agree with Olly, Meaker for Ansari would be my only change.

I also like Foakes coming in above Ansari. Judging from the last couple of seasons, he's a better batter anyway and the higher he bats, the better for his England aspirations.

Jade must have been awful in the first game

Jimbob - don't think that Jade was awful in the first game, just that it was an odd selection at that time, and that Meaker has a much higher ceiling.

As Olly said on the first day...

Good Golly I'm Olly wrote:If only Surrey had a bowler who can break big partnership and prize out wickets on batting wickets with pure pace....

Oh no wait a minute they do - they're just not playing him

But Footitt was playing

We all seem to agree on 4 seamers. Where I may be on my own is that I would include Dernbach. He wasn't in 'my team' for the first CC match but did well in that game when selected by those at the Oval who make those decisions for a living.

What I liked about Dernbach against Warks was that he kept it tight and allowed others, especially Footitt, to attack. It's often said (by me ) that a good football team needs a mix of piano players and piano shifters. Similarly, I'm keen to get the right balance in the seam bowling line up. Without Dernbach, it'll be very attacking. That's great if it works straight away but could prove expensive if it doesn't. In the last two matches Footitt has been on fire at times but ordinary and wayward at others. Meaker has a tendency to do the same.

Footitt and Meaker could complement each other but imo there's an associated risk. That risk probably increases if you have with them the young and fairly inexperienced Currans.

The other plus as I see it of including Dernbach is that it allows Tom Curran to go after the batsmen. Too often, he has to double as a pace man and a willing stock bowler - that combo is asking too much and rarely works.

I would actually leave Meaks on the sidelines or rest Sam Curran. The teenager hasn't hit form with bat or ball yet this season and shouldn't imo be regarded as an automatic selection.