County’s push for Championship win falls foul of weather
COACH PROUD OF EFFORTS TO CLAIM VICTORY BEFORE RAIN
LEICESTERSHIRE head coach Alfonso Thomas gave his team a pat on the back after rain denied them the chance to push for victory on the final day of the Vitality County Championship match against Derbyshire, writes Nigel Gardner.
The visitors were favourites with Derbyshire still 183 runs short of avoiding an innings defeat on 224-6 but heavy rain throughout the morning left large pools of surface water on the County Ground outfield.
After lunch was taken early at 12.30, the umpires inspected and the inevitable decision to call the game off was announced shortly after, leaving Leicestershire with 16 points and Derbyshire nine from the draw.
But despite the frustration, Thomas was “extremely proud” of the way a team missing several frontline bowlers performed.
He said: “I have to doff my cap to the lads. We’ve asked a lot of them in the last four days and they’ve delivered – and more.
“We’ve tried to counter the weather as much as we could. There’s going to be a feeling that we should have pulled out earlier, but I thought we got it right.
“The guys gave it a good go after tea yesterday. Derbyshire batted well, to be fair to them, but I’m extremely proud of the effort that our lads have put in over the last four days.
“The way the lads came out on the evening of day two, to get them four down was a fantastic effort.
“We’ve bowled well as a pack, which is exactly what we want. We don’t want to depend on one bowler, and it’s going to be a tough decision come next week against Northants.”
For Derbyshire head of cricket Mickey Arthur, the unbroken seventh wicket partnership between Wayne Madsen and Alex Thomson was key in guiding the team to safety.
“It was a really good partnership under pressure.
“We’d looked at the forecasts and knew we needed to get into today to get the draw,” he said.
“They were very composed, very clinical and did a really good job for us.”
Arthur also recognised the significance of the dropped catches on the first morning after his side had put Leicestershire in to bat.
“It definitely set the tone for the game, at 10-2 we would have been looking at a totally different scenario. I thought we bowled well with the new ball.
“We asked enough questions to put them under pressure and we created the opportunities but didn’t latch on to those opportunities and that is the very disappointing aspect of it. The effort has been outstanding, the commitment to the cause has been outstanding and the determination they’ve showed to get better every day has been brilliant so I’m never ever questioning that.
“What I did find disappointing was the way we caught because we put a lot of time and work into that and our bowling with the older ball is something we need to work on.
“The other thing is we haven’t had a hundred yet.
“We’ve had guys get 60s but I expect for us to be able to put the opposition under enough pressure we need to get runs on the board and we haven’t been able to do that yet.”
We’ve bowled well as a pack, which is exactly what we want. We don’t want to depend on one bowler Alfonso Thomas