Posted by Warwickshire looked set for another thumping win on Saturday. That they ultimately only delivered a slightly awkward one was however rather less important than what Surrey’s Rory Burns had already done elsewhere against Middlesex.
Still dangerously armed with a Chris Rushworth, Warwickshire were able to dismiss Essex for 126 and 215, giving themselves a 100-run target to win the match. This bowling dominance was however offset by their first innings total of 242 because a big lead does not equate to big bonus points.
A team needs to score 250 to earn their first batting bonus point with further points available at 300, 350, 400 and 450. Surrey’s first innings score of 380 was therefore three better than Warwickshire’s and that’s what’s given them a lead.
We honestly feel that the Championship would gain more than it would lose by binning bonus points altogether.
Top scorer for Surrey was Jamie Smith with 97, but he seems a slightly less significant figure to us than Rory Burns, who captained his side, opened the batting and made 88, all while looking like this.
Burns is now well on his way to becoming one of those incredibly valuable county cricketers who are relentlessly excellent without really having much of a shot of getting called up for England again, what with how his presentation on industrial piping went last time around.
Compounding this, he’s opening with Dom Sibley too.
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Scyld Berry off of the Daily Telegraph reckons the team for the Ireland Test will be as follows:
Duckett
Crawley
Pope
Root
Brook
Bairstow
Stokes
Robinson
Broad
Potts
Leach
He also thinks something called a ‘Josh Tongue’ will be a reserve, whatever that means. Another headline writer’s dream.
‘Ireland set for tongue lashing’
‘Storm Josh: Tongue twister blows into town’
‘Licking all the boxes’
‘Cunning linguist: superstar Josh vows to sledge Aussies’
I’m lost for words, Sam.
That’s right…
…cat (being conspicuously indifferent to cricket) has got my tongue.
The problem with grown men sporting ponytails and such is that you are not at all sure they’re trustworthy. Can such a man – who has laid it bare to the world to see that he is below par when it comes to personal choices – be trusted to respond to his partner’s call for a quick single? Or would he run him out whilst gazing fondly at the pavilion where his favourite shampoo awaits him? These are important questions that selectors cannot possibly ignore. There is a reason Rory Burns will never play for his country, and it has absolutely nothing to do with his batting skills.