County cricket: One-Day Cup shows its worth with entertaining tussles

The Guardian

a day ago

The One-Day Cup is already at the halfway point of the round robin stage, with the top three in each group qualifying for the knockout matches to come in just 10 days' time.
Without peeking, do you know how your county is doing? Compact competitions are often easier to follow than those that sprawl across the calendar or stop and start – I'm looking at you, T20 Blast – but, notwithstanding the chronic under-reporting of the One-Day Cup, is it possible to define a narrative at all? Matches are scheduled every day – except the days that they're not, like last Saturday, this Saturday and next (bank holiday) Monday – and there are no defined gameweeks after which one can look at the table, take stock and consider what is to come.
As with much else in cricket, it could all be done better for fans, players and sponsors. And they are the constituencies that really matter, aren't they?
Gloucestershire top Group A with the only 100% record in the country, which is especially impressive given they are one of the counties past the midpoint of their league campaign having played five matches. It would take an unlikely combination of results to deny them a slot in the knockouts, but the clever structure of eliminations, byes and home advantages means there is still a lot to play for once they, or anyone else, progresses to the next phase.
As if to underline my point above, how many non-Gloucestershire fans could name their captain? A hint: he also held aloft last year's Blast trophy. The name you're looking for is Jack Taylor.
Taylor, a batter who bowls, came to the crease at Worcester after Oliver Price's 66 and immediately lost Ben Charlesworth after his handy 50. Not a crisis but, with 80 needed off 17 overs, four down, Worcestershire had the first sniff of a win in a match they had been chasing since losing the toss. Taylor compiled a half century and steered his team home in the company of fellow old pro Graeme van Buuren.
In the brave new world that always hovers just beyond the grasp of administrators looking at the product and its content, there might not be a place for the likes of Taylor and Van Buuren. They have never played senior international cricket and probably never will. They will be surplus to requirements on the powerpoints that dazzle the tech bros who are the pipers about to call the domestic cricket tune with their franchise riches. Ask any fan if these players should have a place in the English game come 2027 and I suspect the answer will be rather different.
Professional sport is mainly a young person's thing, a brutal sifting of winners and losers – no wonder some find it a tough path to follow. Ali Orr was one of the Sussex youngsters given a chance in those strange Covid summers and named in this column back in 2021 as a bright prospect along with Tom Haines, Aaron Thomason, Danial Ibrahim, Jack Carson, Henry Crocombe and Jamie Atkins. Injury, a move to Hampshire, and navigating changes and setbacks meant that the last of his seven centuries came in May 2024.
He ended that barren spell with a 131 against Leicestershire. Orr and his captain Nick Gubbins put together an opening stand of 202, making the win a formality and keeping Hampshire well placed to finish in the top three. Orr is still only 24 and that knock could be the start of his second coming of a fine batter.
Group B is tighter, with five counties in with a decent shout of qualifying and even sixth-placed Durham not out of it yet. Yorkshire, with Imam-ul-Haq back after missing the defeat against Somerset at York, travelled to Radlett to play Middlesex for the honour of leading the standings after five games.
Though the prolific Pakistani notched an undefeated half century, the match was won by Yorkshire's bowlers, who had the home side five for three and then 129 all out, the match done in 58 overs. The damage was inflicted by the ever-reliable Ben 'Betsy' Coad (three for 26 in his 10 overs) and Matt Milnes (four for 29 from his eight).
Both seamers are 31 and know their games inside out, making them an ideal pair for a competition like this. Milnes, who will return to Kent at the end of the summer after three years at Headingley, will be motivated to leave with a trophy. You wouldn't bet against it.
The hard-fought tussle between Sussex and Lancashire a sun-kissed Hove underlined just how fine a format 50-over cricket can be. It was a match that ebbed and flowed before aforementioned Carson became the late hero.
Lancashire's openers pinged some friendly bowling to the boundary in the powerplay, Michael Jones's 82 off 77 the highlight, before Sussex's spinners, Carson and Archie Lenham, pulled things back. Some pyrotechnics from Harry Singh took Lancashire up to 338 for seven, a score they must have felt confident in defending.
At 241 for one after 33 overs, that confidence had evaporated like ice-cream dropped on the promenade pavement, but the impressive Arav Shetty snared Tom Clark for a brilliant 139, then nabbed Fynn Hudson-Prentice and John Simpson in short order and, when Tom Haines went for 90, the anchor was gone and the home side were all at sea, 54 off nine overs suddenly very distant.
Calm heads were required and few were clearer in their thinking than Carson, who turned into peak Michael Bevan, finishing matters with good running and two sixes just when his team needed them. The result was still in doubt until the third ball of the last over was clobbered to the fence by No 11 Sean Hunt, giving Sussex a home victory. It's not a bad game is it?
Just to show it was no fluke, Somerset and Warwickshire served up another cracker two days later at Taunton.
Tom Lammonby notched a round 100, somewhat surprisingly his first in white-ball cricket, before the Rew brothers inevitably got in on the act with 81 (James) and 41 (Thomas). But, from 218 for three with more than 10 overs still to come, a target of just 310 gave Warwickshire a chance they might not have expected.
The visitors developed a habit of losing wickets at a bad time, the top seven all getting in but nobody topping Rob Yates's 47. Cue Jake Lintott, back in his home town and in at No 8 with 67 needed at just more than a run a ball. He bagged 50 of them himself in the company of wicketkeeper Kai Smith and, when he was done, so was the match.
Both sides are locked on 12 points in second and third, with both playing their last group matches at home. If it does go to the wire, the noise will be big.
This article is from The 99.94 Cricket Blog