u/BlueSwimming

With the season over 🥲 here’s my top performers from across the County Champs (weighted a bit towards Div 1). Who would you take away or add?

Batters

Joe Clarke – Obvious first mention after a stellar season. Top run-scorer in the country (1,288) including centuries. 94, 82 and 150 in three knocks against the champions. Doubt he will ever play for England but has to be mentioned.

Sam Hain – 1,048 runs at 75 and Warwickshire’s best batter in the title run. 142 in the final match, again coming in after a top order collapse.

Dan Lawrence - Earned an England call up with 982 runs at 65 with tons. Double century and then a century in the same match against a sorry Hampshire side. Step 1) Move to the Oval. Step 2) Score heaps of runs. Step 3) England call up.

Tom Abell - makes it onto the list with a triple century in the final game and ended just one run short of topping the Div One run charts. How has he never played for England?

Emilio Gay - four tons in seven games before England took him.

Ricardo Vasconcelos - led Div Two with 1,159 runs and six hundreds. Been doing it for years and just couldn’t get over the line ahead of Kent 😉

Ben McKinney - what a talent. Made 244 against Gloucestershire on his way to 1044 runs at 52.

Beddingham - wow this fella loves the county champs. Another 1000+ run season at 73.

All-rounders

Craig Overton – Will keep this short: player of the season, 53 wickets at 19 plus 734 runs with tons. As a neutral gutted Somerset couldnt get over the line for their first-ever title. (Before this year he’d only made one first-class ton and never reached 50 wickets)

George Hill – 48 wickets at 18 and 748 runs, topping Yorkshire’s team for both runs and wickets.

Bowlers

Ethan Bamber – 69 wickets at 19, ridiculous season and most in the country. Closed out the title run in with three straight five-fors. Will be interesting to see if he gets an England shot given his style.

Olly Stone – 50 wickets at 19 with five five-fors. On fire after the August restart took 25 wickets in four games.

Liam Patterson-White – Best spinner with 42 wickets, plus 474 runs, and could well be in-line for the Bangladesh tour this winter. Would love to see him given a go!

Matthew Potts - still young and plenty of time to get back in the England fold. Another 60 wickets at 18 and will be interesting to see how to goes in Div 1 next summer.

Shout out for a couple of elder statesmen…

James Anderson - just reminding everyone he averaged 17 at 44 years old. Another 50 poles onto the pile.

Kyle Abbot - if I told you he took 64 wickets averaging 16, where would you think his team came? Safe to say he carried a poor Hants bowling attack and has signed an extension through to next year.

Keepers

James Bracey - five tons, 1000+ runs and averaging 44. Could be interesting if Smith has a poor winter.

First three games of the season we were very lucky to come out with 2D and 1L.

Vs Durham we were chasing 357, actually put up a decent response ending on 234/5
Vs Northants they scored 680/2 and we were 430/15 saved by the weather (also true Compton batted heroically to save the draw)
Vs Worcs loss by an innings

In summer these games would’ve likely come out with 3 Ls. Small chance we chase 357 but Durham are unbeaten.

Since then, we’re 5W and 1D. Including three clutch performances winning by 2 wickets and then back to back (with a 2 month gap lol) 49 and 46 run wins against Middlesex.

Who do you think will get promoted? 5 matches left

Despite its criticisms, all of which I agree with, I’ve still watched the Hundred every year and gone to a handful of games.

I follow West Indies vs Pakistan, Bangladesh vs Australia, random T20 leagues round the world, realistically I’m going to watch an English tournament with our best English talent and a sprinkle of overseas guns, despite the issues.

But this year just really struggled to get into it. Watched a few games on TV, mainly ladies whilst working in the afternoon. Followed the scorecards on Cricinfo. Played the fantasy game.

But for the first time didn’t go to a single game, which wasn’t a conscious decision. Actually ended up going to two One Day Cup games which I’ve never done before and loved.

What I did enjoy this year was seeing players make unexpected breakthroughs. Loved seeing Donald get his chance and take it. Same for Walter towards the end of the tournament. And pleasing to see the battery of international English pace bowlers showing off throughout the tournament. But are enjoying individual performances enough to keep a tournament going.

Anyone else go in previous years but find 2026 didn’t really click for them?

After frankly two terrible white ball series against England - especially in T20 - and the series loss to Ireland, do you think India bounce back against Zim?

India are yet to win under Shreyas’s captaincy and away in Zimbabwe is a tough place to go.

Is this genius and one last Herculean effort to get over the line? Or narcissistic and the team winning the series should come first? I’m baffled.

Wonder if it was his decision, McCullums, or the teams.

Can’t help but feel like he triggered his retirement because of how hard he found it at Lords. It didn’t seem planned, it seemed like he felt like he couldn’t compete at the level anymore.

Well, that pitch was a disgrace, and now they’ve got a flatty in Nottingham and everyone’s going to cash in.