SURREY VS BIRMINGHAM BEARS NATWEST T20 BLAST QUARTER FINAL

A 15 man squad has been named for tonight’s NatWest T20 Quarter-Final against the Birmingham Bears at the Kia Oval.
Tom Curran, who missed last week’s vital victories over Gloucestershire and Kent with a back problem, misses out – as does Kevin Pietersen, who has not recovered sufficiently from the calf injury he sustained earlier this season.
Once again, the squad is augmented by the young trio of Freddie van den Bergh, Ryan Patel and Will Jacks, all of whom have been in Second XI action this week against the MCC Universities in New Malden.
The game is being broadcast live on the Sky Sports Cricket channel.
Full Surrey Squad
Gareth Batty (captain)
Scott Borthwick
Rory Burns
Rikki Clarke
Sam Curran
Jade Dernbach
Aaron Finch
Ben Foakes
Moises Henriques
Will Jacks
Stuart Meaker
Ryan Patel
Ollie Pope
Freddie van den Bergh
Jason Roy
The young trio are there just to make the numbers up so will it be heartbreak for Burns,Borthwick or Foakes?
Over to you chaps

Thanks, JimBob.

Assume you're going tonight. I'm at home, hoping to watch some on the box. In case they don't say on Sky (I fear it'll be clowns like Cork, Flintoff and your buddy with the shiney gnashers on comms whilst the more sensible ones are at the Test), I'll be grateful for your views on the wicket. Is it a new one, the one for Monday's Championship match? We certainly don't want to give Jeetan Patel a used track to work with. I think the Corporal said that one look from him and our batsmen usually turn to jelly.

I would leave out Borthwick but have given up trying to second guess what we might actually end up doing!

The Burger Van, Ryan Patel and Judo Jacks (that's for older posters! ) were playing yesterday on day 2 of a nearby seconds' Championship game - not sure if they've been pulled out of that now. In any case, I can only see them warming the bench tonight.

I have no confidence in our middle order so we need something special from the openers yet again.

Agreed, jimbob. Many commentators speak of Surrey's strength on paper but I disagree. We are short of batting substance though with Norah at 10 we bat deep (as we needed to do last week v Glos). I agree also that the logical 11 would see the three youngsters + Borthwick miss out.

Yep, I share the concerns about our batting.

Whilst there's a fair bit of quality in the line up, it's the scoring rate that is the worry. Batting first, a couple of middle order batsmen each scoring, say, 17 of 20 balls is my perception as to how we're likely to go. That equates to just 34 runs from a third of the whole innings and means we can't set an invincible target as well as placing massive demands on all our bowlers.

New wkt used Birmingham win toss and bowl heartbreak goes to burns

Good man, JimB. Thanks.

Good luck Surrey. Hopefully see you at Finals day.

Tom Curran a big miss in my opinion, normally rises to the big occasion. Clarke vs Sibley - interesting!

Cheers, Jimbo.

Agree with you about Tom Curran. Normally effective at the death, I particularly like that he's always prepared to take responsibility.

For me, Surrey have done better in the Clarke / Sibley swap. Probably another jinx!

75-0 off the first 6

Looking forward to seeing how we fail to make 160 from here

Good Golly I'm Olly wrote:75-0 off the first 6

Looking forward to seeing how we fail to make 160 from here

Cracking, cracking start ... but, yeah - what happens next?

Excellent start by Surrey - tho there is a certain sense that the moment the first wicket falls the scoring rate thereafter will drop to 4 an over! Roy brings up a fine half century with his third 6.

Some useful extras helping to keep scoreboard ticking after the fall of Finch.

guildfordbat wrote:We certainly don't want to give Jeetan Patel a used track to work with. I think the Corporal said that one look from him and our batsmen usually turn to jelly.

Roy falls to Patel for a fine 74... 142/2 after 13 overs is a good position. But....we've seen it before.

A very good last over gets us over 200 to 204-5

If we can't defend that we don't deserve to go through - batters done their job tonight

Surrey fell away steadily after the fall of Roy. Pope, Clarke and Curran all out after scoring at less than a run a ball. But Henriques 48* kept the show on the road and a very useful last over (21 runs) with Foakes contributing a quickfire 12 off 5 balls, brings the total up to 204 - 5. I would have settled for that score beforehand.

Have to agree with the commentators re: Foakes coming in at 7 - he was our best one day Cup batsman this year, surely he could do similar in the t20?

Corporalhumblebucket wrote:Surrey fell away steadily after the fall of Roy.  Pope, Clarke and Curran all out after scoring at less than a run a ball. But Henriques 48* kept the show on the road and a very useful last over (21 runs) with Foakes contributing a quickfire 12 off 5 balls, brings the total up to 204 - 5.  I would have settled for that score beforehand.  

Bang on.

I would also mention that we scored 5 more runs in the final over than we did in the 17th, 18th and 19th overs combined. A batting side is usually going to have some form of wobble in t20 but we do seem to specialize in them as we go from one extreme to the other.

Anyway, the Bears need to go at more than 10 an over. Think that'll be beyond Sibley at least for any period.

Bloomin' 'eck! Bears 59/1 off 5. Hose on a charge with a strike rate over 300. Sibley at the other end has 7 off 12 - don't get him out!!

guildfordbat wrote:Bloomin' 'eck! Bears 59/1 off 5. Hose on a charge with a strike rate over 300. Sibley at the other end has 7 off 12 - don't get him out!!

The very next ball Dernbach dismisses Sibley. Hain comes in and wallops his first 2 balls for a four and a six!

At the end of 7 overs:
Surrey were 83/0
Bears are 82/2.

With 10 wickets in hand, we should have been in the stronger position. However, we again didn't fully build on it and now look second best ....

Warks slight favourites at half way through their innings, although a couple of quick wickets could change that.

When it looks like Meaker and Henriques are going to bowl a tight over, holes show up in the dam. Bears are definitely favourites in my book. The Corporal is right that a couple of quick wickets would make a difference but they do need to be quick.

Well now. That is a controversial one!

Directly in my line of sight. Clean as a whistle and held off the ground. Why the hell do they refer these kinds of things when the fielder'a body language says he knows he's taken it? And the 'wide' that followed went over the stumps when the batsman moved across to have a swing. The fight's gone out of Surrey a bit here. They need to re-group.

Apparently Jeremy Lloyds doesn't have eyes and Gareth Batty forgot that Rikki Clarke was going at FIFTEEN AN OVER ffs Gareth bowl yourself out for Christ sake!

Once the soft signal was not out it was never getting overturned. I thought it hit the grass to be fair. Surrey's fielding seriously cost them in the end.

JDizzle wrote:Once the soft signal was not out it was never getting overturned. I thought it hit the grass to be fair. Surrey's fielding seriously cost them in the end.

Apparently JDizzle doesn't have eyes either

Any reason Borthwick plays as a specialist number 8 batsman?

JDizzle wrote:Once the soft signal was not out it was never getting overturned. I thought it hit the grass to be fair. Surrey's fielding seriously cost them in the end.

Had to make do with radio comms so can't comment on that. Did though sound as we were sloppy at times and didn't make the most of things. Our middle order wasn't as bad tonight as it has been but was still a weakness and didn't properly build on the opening stand.

With some seriousness, I would add that the Bears were fortunate that we got Sibley out early on. We could have done with him using up a few more overs at under a run a ball.

As Guildfordbat alludes, Surrey's biggest mistake tonight was to get Sibley out overall though, if you can't defend 200plus, controversy about the catch notwithstanding , you don't deserve to win!

On the evidence of last night alone, both sides will feel they did good business offloading Sibley and Clarke to each other. I still think we got the better of the deal given the experience Clarke will share with our still young players on the up.