Pears looking forward to group decider after derby draw - The Worcester Observer

Pears looking forward to group decider after derby draw

Worcester Editorial 26th Aug, 2020 Updated: 27th Aug, 2020   0

Worcestershire are looking forward to a Bob Willis Trophy Central Group decider with Somerset at Blackfinch New Road starting on September 6.

Worcestershire’s home Central Group encounter with Warwickshire was an early victim of the weather this week after heavy overnight rain on Monday.

But the 13 points collected by the County means there will be all to play for against their West County opponents in 12 days.

Worcestershire Club Captain Joe Leach said: “We will take the points, we will see what happens at Taunton today, and it sets us up for what in effect is a red ball semi-final in a couple of weeks.




“If you had offered us that at the start of the season, we would have taken that. It is exciting.”

Umpires Rob Baily and Jeremy Lloyds decided no play would be possible after inspecting a saturated outfield and play was abandoned at 10.25am.


There were puddles on the covers and outfield, and more heavy rain started falling shortly after the game was called off.

It was a fixture dominated by the bat in which only 16 wickets fell in three days.

Leach said: “You can’t do much about the weather. It looked pretty bleak for a few days, and we knew we were going to get this storm. The ground is saturated, you’ve got no chance of getting on today.

“In some respects, it is disappointing that the circumstances didn’t allow a result, but once again we applied ourselves exceptionally with the bat to get a first-innings ‘win’ with this 120 overs rule.

“With the ball for large parts, we set out to do on what was a very batter-friendly task, and we stuck to our task as well as we could. It was heading for a draw from ten past eleven on day one if we are perfectly honest.”

Head Coach Alex Gidman said: “We are looking forward to the Somerset game already and will have to win regardless of their result at Taunton.

“It is a knockout game in effect, and I’ve been impressed with the way the players have gone about their business for all four games.

“We’ve played some outstanding cricket, Somerset are a good team, but we will look forwards to it and give it a really good go.”

Regarding the Warwickshire game, Gidman said: “It was a very flat wicket and was going to be hard for either team to force a result, but the weather took it out of our hands.

“We had chances to be fair to reduce them to less than they scored and that would have meant we could have had a more significant lead, but again, as it turned out, that would have been redundant due to the wash-out today.

“I think we dropped a couple of chances. We didn’t bowl poorly but didn’t bowl as well as we would have liked on the first day.”

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