County round-up
The stories from around the grounds in the Championship
FORMER Warwickshire captain Varun Chopra is ignoring uncertainty surrounding his future and concentrating on enjoying his cricket back in the ranks at Edgbaston.
Chopra led Warwickshire to the Nat West Blast T20 title two years ago when he was deputising for the injured Jim Troughton as skipper, but he served only one full season as official captain before handing over the reins to Ian Bell during the winter.
The 28 year-old former Essex opener has started the new campaign impressively, making a century against champions Yorkshire last month and passing 50 four more times in first-class cricket in a rain-affected start to the season.
But Chopra’s future with Warwickshire remains uncertain. He is out of contract at the end of the season and is reluctant to be drawn on whether he will be in Birmingham next season.
“There are no real discussions happening at the moment,” Chopra said. “I am out of contract at the end of the year, but I’m just enjoying my cricket at the moment. I’m not thinking about too much else other than getting my head down and scoring runs.”
As a player in the final year of his contract, other counties will be aware that Chopra is now effectively a free agent and that he was left out of Warwickshire’s side for their opening T20 match against Nottinghamshire last Friday.
Warwickshire picked Sam Hain, who impressed in white-ball cricket on the pre-season tour to Dubai, ahead of Chopra and he responded with a match-winning 92 not out on his T20 debut.
“I enjoy playing all forms of the game, I don’t see myself just as a four-day specialist. I think I have performed well in T20 cricket over the years,” Chopra said.
“I am extremely disappointed not to be playing in T20 cricket at present. However, I do understand that Sam Hain is a special talent and that playing in white-ball cricket will develop his game. “I think he is going to be a really good player and hopefully he can get confidence from white ball cricket and translate that into some four-day runs for us.” Hain has found Championship runs harder to come by this season with two failures here. But his struggles were counter-balanced by a composed century on Championship debut for young Scot Andy Umeed who replaced Ian Westwood as Chopra’s opening partner. “Andy is a nice player. There are reasonably high expectations of him here at the club and it’s always nice to see someone who is young and hungry come into the team,” Chopra said.
Despite Umeed’s ton and Chris Woakes’ nine first-innings wickets, Warwickshire were outfought by Durham, who turned the match on its head with James Weighell’s maiden five-wicket haul and Keaton Jennings’ 113.
Durham’s financial position may be shaky, but captain Paul Collingwood believes things are more solid on the playing side.
“Of course we would love to have an overseas player in three competitions, but the one thing it does do is give us opportunities to bring youngsters through,” Collingwood said.
“There’s an abundance of youngsters in our team. If you can bring them through and win at the same time it’s a complete added bonus.”