Who needs The Hundred when you can celebrate old favourites and fresh talent playing proper one-day cricket over fifty overs: The Three Hundred, if you like.
Split into two groups, most counties played three fixtures in the first week, and only Middlesex triumphed in all three. They top Group B after casting aside Essex, Hampshire and Glamorgan. The last two were nothing short of massacres. Against Hampshire at the Rose Bowl, Josh De Caires produced List A personal bests with both bat and ball, following his 75 with 6-35 from his off-breaks. He didn’t get a bowl against Glamorgan because Toby Roland-Jones, Naavya Sharma and Noah Cornwell ripped out Glamorgan for 66 all by themselves. De Caires plundered ten boundaries as Middlesex ticked off the runs inside ten overs. Interestingly, Roland-Jones is almost as old as Sharma and Cornwell combined. Seamer Sharma claimed eight wickets in total from these, his first List A matches of what could be a long career.
Other youngsters also made their mark this week. 20-year-old Hamza Shaikh turned out for Warwickshire a few weeks ago but his opening trio of innings in Leicestershire colours yielded 228 runs, including a maiden century against Surrey. He also scored 91 in an epic attempt to surpass Lancashire’s formidable 383-4, which included 135 by Keaton Jennings. South African all-rounder Ruan de Swardt contributed 126 in the same innings, and two wickets to boot.
That Group A Leicester-Surrey encounter turned out to be a game of two R Patels. Leicester opener Rishi struck 110, exceeding Surrey opener Ryan’s 97, although it was the latter’s 3-44 that nudged him into my Team of the Week. Blast winners Northamptonshire could not maintain their white ball form, losing to Kent and Surrey despite a run of three half-centuries from skipper Nathan McSweeney.
Somerset lead Group A, thanks to a couple of hefty batting totals in victories over Gloucestershire and Warwickshire. Tom Lammonby is the competition’s leading scorer so far. Three 80+ innings but no centuries, but Lewis Goldsworthy did reach 103 against Warwicks. 21-year-old Joshua Thomas also caught the eye.
Partnership of the week belonged to a pair of Monmouthshire products, Jack Hope-Bell (aged 19) and ‘keeper Alex Horton (21). Each notching tons, they shared 240 for the sixth wicket at Neath in a twelve-run win against Sussex, who, along with Derbyshire, lost all three Group B ties.
Ben Stokes has considerably greater experience, and he made two extremely rare 50-over outings with Durham. No wickets, but an aggregate of 181 run not out, featuring eight sixes, must have delighted both home and away supporters.
Top bowling figures of the week were delivered by Yorkshire’s Ben Coad (5-12 v Sussex) and Worcestershire’s Fateh Singh (6-32 v Derbyshire). However, such are the vagaries of limited-overs cricket that in their other games, they went for 77 and 81, respectively. Can’t win ‘em all.
Team of the Week: Jennings (Lan), R Patel (Sur), Luxton (Yor), De
Caires (Mid), Lammonby (Som), Prest (Ham), Hamza Shaikh (Lei), Horton (Gla +), de
Swardt (Lei), Fateh Singh (Wor), Naavya Sharma (Mid)
