Cricket Taylor says it’s time for white-ball side to start delivering
SKIPPER Jack Taylor is calling on Gloucestershire’s underachieving white ball side to finally step up this season and put their name on some silverware.
For several years, Gloucestershire have been in the mix when the early-season predictions are made, but there has been no success since the 2015 One-Day Cup win over Surrey.
“A lot’s been made of our T20 side over the last couple of years, the strongest team we’ve had on paper, etc etc - but ultimately we didn’t get out of the groups in either year,” said Taylor. “We’ve underachieved with the group we’ve had.”
The side will look different this year, with the bowling of Benny Howell, Ian Cockbain’s runs and Ryan Higgins’ all-round skills having moved on. Taylor said: “We’ve got all bases covered, we have good experienced players and good youngsters coming through You need people to step up and do their jobs which is what we’re going to ask of people this year.
“There are going to be opportunities for people to put a stamp on a spot and we’ve got some great talent across the board, some of whom haven’t had a opportunity in T20 yet. But I truly believe we can go and do something special this year.
“There are spots up for grabs. We have added Marchant de Lange to the mix which is exciting and gives us that raw, extra pace which we haven’t had so that’s a huge point of difference.”
Last year, Gloucestershire were left to rue a defeat by Somerset, where Roelof van der Merwe smashed 48 off 15 balls, and two losses to Hampshire. Taylor said: “If we look back on last year, how many people in the squad can say
they had a really good year in T20?
“Not many, if any so ultimately we are going to ask more people to step up and do their jobs. If we have five, six, seven guys across the tournament having a good year that will help us do the business.”
And with Howell, Cockbain and Higgins going, doors are open for new stars - the likes of Tom and Ollie Price, and young wicketkeeper-batter Ben Wells.
Taylor said: “Historically we’ve had a squad that’s played a lot of cricket so everyone knows their games in and out, but we’ve got these young guys like Tom and Ollie, Ben Wells who can come in and have an impact.
“Payney (David Payne) should be back too, he’s obviously a high class bowler as he showed for Perth in the winter in the Big Bash and he’s a great asset for us as is Zafar Gohar, who’s shown in 50 over and fourday cricket what a class act he is and adds value with bat and ball. We have a number of seamers, different batting combinations, as good a spin line-up as you can ask for with
Tom Smith, Zaf, Graeme van Buuren, Ollie Price - but it’s about going out and doing it, not just being good on paper.”
The mentality will be the same for Taylor and his team when it comes to the 50-over One-Day Cup.
“We’re going in to try to win”, said Taylor. “We built up some good momentum last year but a bad performance against Warwickshire killed our net run rate and it came down to that in the end. We finished the tournament really strongly but that Warwickshire game really hurt us.”