View From The Blues: Steelbacks should have seized their big chance

Last year’s club tagline of ‘Glory, Honour, Pride’ has quickly turned into Gory, Horror, Ride for the Steelbacks as the Royal London Cup campaign also came crashing down this week.
Former Northants batsman Mal Loye says the players need to improve for the sake of their own careersFormer Northants batsman Mal Loye says the players need to improve for the sake of their own careers
Former Northants batsman Mal Loye says the players need to improve for the sake of their own careers

This year’s motto of ‘Reign, Defend, Conquer’ should read Rain, Pretend and Canter!

I’m really annoyed the team hasn’t seized the chance to grab a fairly easy quarter-final chance in the 50-over, especially as the players owe the fans a performance or two.

I get that we have had injuries all year and can’t afford a batting coach, but certain players should be stepping up in this competition.

Quite a few are out of contract and the Royal London Cup was their last chance of redemption.

Mal Loye was spot on saying that they are fighting for their careers.

I understand there is some good news on contracts that the rather positive Adam Rossington has been offered a two-year deal because he is out of contract at Middlesex in September.

That deal may well happen as the Middlesex coaches at a recent seconds game were heard to be negative about keeping him because of injuries.

It’s all a shame as the Steelbacks were in the game at the Ageas Bowl last Friday against the Hampshire Hawks before the rain washed out any attempt to chase 250, a D/L win that would have put us into a good position in the group.

Great to see Azharullah score a List A personal best with five for 38 after the dross he bowled at the previous 50-over and Chambers finding some nip with three for 47.

Leicestershire, of course, is the wettest ground in the UK for Northants and it couldn’t survive the weather on Sunday, making last Monday’s home floodlit with Derbyshire a must-win.

Even though half of their team had jumped ship and Northants had caught one of them (Turner) after walking the plank we still couldn’t put them away. If you can’t beat Derbyshire you will go nowhere.

An early thunderstorm that took out 28 overs in front of an appalling crowd was the portent that perhaps a hat-trick of washouts would have been the better option here.

The groundsmen clearly had that on their mind as they were slow to clear the covers, preferring radar-watching than cloud-spotting, hoping for the next shower to finish the match.

But Umpire Wiley snapped some orders as they slid menacingly by (the dark clouds, not the groundsmen) and the players took the field for an awkward 32-over game, only warm sunshine keeping the crowd from sticking around.

A midweek floodlit 50-over was always going to be a tough sell after the buzz of Friday night Twenty20 and this competition has to be moved back to the weekends next year or it’s going to die a slow death. Extend the season into early October if you have to.

Will Durston decided to cream an aggressive hundred as the spectacular clouds piled up high to catch a glimpse of his obvious talent, putting on exactly one hundred in the process with Marcus North for the second wicket to close on 211 for six.

The mysterious D/L rules bumped up the chase to 227, which proved six runs too much as the Steelbacks fumbled the chase. After Levi (62) had kept Northants in the game I thought Hall (43) would have whispered in the ear of his partners to let him score for the next five overs and save the big hitting from White and co until the last two or three overs and so wickets still in hand for a violent blitz.

But his partners chose to slog out in panic and 154 for four tumbled to 221 for nine for the six-run defeat, Middlebrook getting one of the two mighty sixes needed off the last two balls for an unlikely tie but in truth the game not as close as it looked.

It was set up for guys like Matt Spriegel and Kyle Coetzer to score a winning fifty but again they fell short, Spriegel, predictably scratching around for less than 20 and then sloping back to the pavilion when the acceleration comes.

Holing out in places where he should know better as he catches guys there all day long in the field from those misjudged hacks.

I don’t think he has done anywhere enough for a new contract and any other player would have been dropped and released by now.

But for some reason he is still there and rock solid in the team - the specialised fielder who needs to learn to bat properly.