Championship - half-way stage (Page 1 of 2)

yes i tend to agree with you both.

good to see muzza back in form and rmj will be greatly missed.

one of  the younger batsmen is  doing ok(ish) and let's hope nash and yardy can score a pile of runs in the next batch of matches.  ditto joyce who should be match fit by then.

monty hasn't found his england form of old but very steady and may yet do so.

but probably fair to say the jury still out on anyon and monty as our two big name signings?

hopefully we will  push on in the second half of the  season however i think we would struggle with this squad back in the first division. 

so having recovered from the pain of relegation it won't be the end of the world if we don't go up this time round.

http://stats.cricinfo.com/ccdiv2-10/eng … tournament

Sometimes the perception is at odds with the statistics so above are Sussex CC averages for you to peruse....

well collymore's batting has gone right off the boil this year

If someone had said in early April that by June 7th, Sussex would be 2nd in the LV2 championship with 112 points; 3rd in the Clydesdale Bank 40; and top of their T20 league, supporters would have bitten their hand off.

The problem is we've been spoilt by success during the last 10 years and expectations, in my view, are now too high.

Last edited by softandfluffy (09-06-2010 13:45:37)

midsummer slumber is an interesting piece and, yes, it is a shame monty didn't get another bowl at derbyshire.

i am sure he will come more into his own in august and hopefully bowling in tandem with olly.

soft and fluffy - yes, the bar has certainly risen.

I agree with s and f that expectations are far too high now. We have just been through a "golden age" but now that team has finished. In my view, we cannot expect to maintain the same level of success in the next period. We must give our younger players time to develop their skills and establish themselves in the team.

This season we have done quite well, I feel. I didn't expect us to keep on winning our CC matches - but the flyer that we got means that we do have a great chance of promotion now. The key will probably be how well Monty and Olly bowl in tandem on the drier pitches later on. And our one-day cricket has generally been good apart from the shocker against Unicorns - and a result like that can happen to anyone.

The one day stuff has beome rather montotonus and disappointing of late.

We seem to be doing well in championship cricket but don't expect much success in the remaing part of the season.

The bowlers have come to the fore more than I had expected espcially Collymore and Panesar who has turned a corner. Special mention to Olly who, in my opinion, should play in all of the reaming matches. He is I beleive the most improved player of the season.

Good to see Hatchett emerge. Gatting and Thornley haven't sadly kicked on and still have much to prove.

With Sussex 14 points clear, I would see it as a positive advantage that we still have Glamorgan and Northants to play: we have some control over the outcome of their matches, whatever the weather.

I'm not sure where this fear of promotion comes regarding the development of younger players, Wright, Nash and (I imagine but may be slightly out) Yardy have only played Div 1 before this season for us, and it may be harder to gauge performances in Div 2. It's certainly nice to play some different teams and all, but wouldn't a couple of years of Fulhamesque mediocrity be better than either contriving to stay in Div 2 or yoyoing al la West Brom?

I dont think we should think that the first division is too difficult for us - not convinced theres a huge gulf between the two divisions anyway and I do think this season has helped our bowling attack in particular gain some confidence - so really think we should be a lot more compoetitive than we were in the year we went down

yes Xian - i was assuming we would get a couple of quality players in (preferably one bowler/ one batsman) when I said it