Disjointed schedule a challenge for Ripley’s men

The County visit Taunton on Sunday afternoon in the Friends Life t20 for a 2.30pm start and at 11am the following morning they start a County Championship game against Lancashire at the County Ground.

With so much cricket to cram into a relatively short space of time it is inevitable that there will be anomalies every now and then but head coach David Ripley is looking at the matter in a grin and bear it kind of way.

He said: “It’s not ideal for us at all.

“Unfortunately it’s just how the schedule is and we’ve got to deal with it.

“It hasn’t done us any favours but we’re paid to play cricket and that’s what we’ll have to do.”

That attitude will also have to be adopted by Lancashire who entertain Leicestershire at Old Trafford on Sunday and that means, as Ripley acknowledged, the County won’t be at a disadvantage.

He added: “Lancashire are playing at the same time as us so that’s something and the Championship game is definitely one to look forward to.”

Ripley will delay making any announcements on the team until the Taunton game is out of the way but he has admitted that some thought will have to go into the make-up of the side given the pair of lengthy bus trips that they will have endured.

He said: “From our perspective we’ll have to have a close look at the players.

“There’s a lot of travelling in the bus and we’ll have to see how people pull up from that.

“It could mean that there are a few changes from the side that we would ideally like to put out but that is a decision we’ll have to make on Monday morning.”