New Attacking Approach Boosts County Championship
Yorkshire duo Finlay Bean and Ben Coad believe that a fresh approach to red ball cricket has been reflected in the action on the pitch during the current County Championship this season.
The 2024 campaign has seen a number of impressive performances with the bat, not least Bean combining with Adam Lyth to set a new record for an opening partnership at Scarborough in an innings victory against Gloucestershire.
Elsewhere, Glamorgan fell just one run short of setting a new world record for a fourth innings chase when bowled out for 592 against Gloucestershire, whilst Louis Kimber smashed 243 from just 127 balls for Leicestershire whilst chasing 464 to win against Sussex.
Those performances have come on the back of the revised approach taken to Test cricket by the England side under Brendan McCullum, with the introduction of ‘Bazball’ seeing his side invariably go on the attack to chase a positive result.
Chatting on the Vertu Motors stand at the recent Great Yorkshire Show, both Bean and Coad said the impact of England’s approach on the international stage was very much filtering down to the First Class game.
“Red ball cricket for me is still the best format of the game, particularly with the way that England have taken it to a new level,” Coad said. “It can be a boring format for fans when a game is running over four or five days, but when you see the direction England have taken and how it is now coming down to the County Championship, it’s an exciting time for the sport.”
“We’re in the performance and entertainment business, and we want to bring the crowds through the gate,” Bean added. “No-one wants to come and watch a team just block out for day to try and get a draw, and we need to play in a way that attracts the crowds. We’ve all seem the new brand of cricket that the England team are playing, and it can only be good thing that we’re seeing more of it in the County Championship.”
Yorkshire fans have certainly been entertained in the most recent matches in the County Championship, with the Vertu Motors-backed side having won its last two games by an innings to sit third in the Division 2 standings.
The first of those two wins came at Scarborough in late June, where Bean shared a record-breaking opening partnership of 307 with Adam Lyth to set up the victory.
His score of 164 wasn’t his best of the campaign however, with the youngster having earlier set a new personal best of 173 during a hard-fought draw with Glamorgan.
“In the Gloucestershire game, we lost the toss so to then get a score like that was great,” he said. “I remember were in the 280-290 mark and I was getting carried away and Lythy told me off and to calm down as there aren’t many chances to get a 300 partnership! It was really pleasing to get that score as it set up the victory.
“I’ve scored hundreds in the past but they haven’t been big hundreds, and now I’ve passed 150 twice this season. Hitting a new personal best against Glamorgan with Joe Root at the other end was a fantastic feeling.
“In both innings, I think it took me 30 balls or more to get off the mark so it shows how you have to take your time and get your eye in. It’s all about making sure that you do the best job you can on the good days to make up for those days when you get a low score.”
Whilst the performance of Bean – as well as fellow opener Lyth – has been impressive so far, the real strength in the Yorkshire side had arguably been the bowling attack, with the team having scored more bonus points with the ball than any other side across both divisions.
Key to that has been the performance of Coad, who continues to move towards the landmark of 300 First Class wickets having picked up 28 so far this season at an average of just 17.39.
That included figures of 6-30 that helped set up the innings victory against Derbyshire at Chesterfield, although the likes of Jordan Thompson and Vishwa Fernando have also contributed plenty of wickets to the cause as Yorkshire bid to return to Division 1.
“I don’t want to sound big-headed, but I’m pleased with the way that I’ve bowled this season,” Coad said. “I had a big game last time out against Derbyshire but there are times I feel I’ve bowled better than that earlier in the season, but just didn’t get the wickets.
“That is how it can be sometimes as you can bowl really well and not manage to take a wicket, but then you can put in a more average performance but you come away with five wickets to your name. It’s all about doing the best you can do every time you go out to bowl, and hopefully you’ll get the rewards.
“We have a great set of lads within the Club and we play as a unit, as it is no good if there is someone building pressure at one end and then someone else is letting it go at the other. That won’t get the wickets so you need to have a strong attack that can come in where needed, and we pride ourselves on the fact that whoever has come in has been able to do a job.”
With the current focus on the Vitality Blast, and with the One Day Cup still to come, action won’t resume in the County Championship until current Division 2 leaders Sussex visit Scarborough in late August.
That game could be crucial to determining whether Yorkshire go up at the end of a campaign that has – thus far – gone well, with only two defeats from nine games, albeit with five draws.
“I said from the start of the season that there could be no excuses this year and we should be going for promotion and I maintain that,” Coad said. “We didn’t play as well as we could at the start of the season, but we’ve shown how good we are in recent games.
“That is how we should be playing, and hopefully we have now set a standard that we can maintain through the rest of the campaign. If we play half as well in the final five games as we have in the last two, then we should go up.”
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