Live Streaming to the Rescue

 Posted by Tony Hutton

A week without live cricket was rescued in no small fashion by the ever improving live streaming of county cricket in the shape of the Royal London Cup, which has been progressing rapidly at a variety of grounds throughout the country. Sadly one notable exception was the Clifton Park ground in York which hosted two of Yorkshire's home games last week. This was reported as 'technical difficulties' which provided yet another in Yorkshire's long list of public relations failures. However not to worry, our reporter John Winn was there to tell us what happened.

Technology at Clifton Park, York but no live streaming available.

If we start on Sunday last, 1st August, we were spoilt for choice with Somerset playing Yorkshire at Taunton, Notts at home to Leicester at Welbeck and Sussex at Hove taking on Gloucester, fresh from their win at Scarborough over Durham. As so often happens in these games one man plays an outstanding innings to win the match. That was certainly the case at Taunton where despite Matt Revis scoring 58 not out for Yorkshire, James Hildreth  made it look all too easy in winning the game for Somerset with a majestic 61 not out, in a game reduced to twenty overs per side.

Taunton on a sunny day.

The commentator at Taunton made great play of the fact that a young man from Bristol was playing for the home side. No doubt he will remain 'Drissell from Brissel' for evermore. Meanwhile we were able to watch a pretty poor batting display from Leicestershire at the John Fretwell Sporting Complex, Nettleworth, the home of Welbeck Colliery cricket club. Nottinghamshire in the powerful shape of Luke Fletcher destroyed the first part of the innings leaving Leicester at 68-7 at one stage. Enter yet another precocious youngster, one of many to be seen in this competition, this time in the shape of Rehan Ahmed, who will be seventeen in two weeks time. He stuck around to play a recovery role of 35 not out and managed to take the visitors' final score to 144 all out.

The Welbeck ground on a previous occasion.

The spectators all looked well muffled up against the rather inclement weather and were no doubt relieved when Nottinghamshire knocked off the runs in rapid style by the twenty first over, thanks mainly to acting captain Pete Trego with a hard hitting innings of 39, before being caught behind off the aforementioned Ahmed. Notts winning comfortably by seven wickets. A much closer game meanwhile was in progress at Hove, in a game eventually shortened to forty two overs per side. Sussex again fielded a handful of very promising teenagers, but it was Gloucester's young man Charlesworth who impressed again initially with 39 at a run a ball. Then the heroes of Scarborough last week, Taylor and Scott came to the party again.

Hove as it was way back in 1995.

Taylor was more restrained than last week but compiled yet another useful innings of 52 with good support from Scott who made 38. A total of 218-8 was not insurmountable and Sussex were looking good while Ben Brown was at the crease although wickets continued to fall at the other end with two for the Australian Worrall in his opening spell and then Tom Smith, the slow left armer, took three wickets to destroy the middle order. Wicket keeper Olly Carter took over the main scoring role when Brown was out for 63 and managed a quick fire 50 to keep the home side in the hunt.

Eventually with the last pair together and 14 runs still required 17 year old Archie Lenham took charge. He looked confident enough until the fifth ball of the penultimate over when he unwisely went for a second run only to be run out by a direct hit from Tome Lace which gave Gloucester the victory by just three runs.

Durham's temporary home.

Thursday 5th August produced live streaming from the South Northumberland ground, Gosforth, which is just north of Newcastle upon Tyne where Durham were entertaining Lancashire who provided probably the best live streaming in the business as we saw recently from Sedbergh. Durham batted and Alex Lees got them off to a good start with 50 but then appeared two unlikely heroes in the shape of former Kent batsman Sean Dickson who made a century and yet another youngster Luke Doneathy, nineteen years old just a week ago who made a confident 69 not out in an unbroken partnership of 156 with Dickson.

A county second XI game in progress at South Northumberland.

A total of 327-6 proved far too many for Lancashire who collapsed after early fifties from Bohannan and Jones. Doneathy showed off his all round skills with 4-36 as the Lancashire tail collapsed rapidly. A splendid victory for the home side and Durham will now look forward with confidence to qualifying for the final stages of the competition.

Behind the scenes at Grace Road.

Must not forget the final stages we managed to see from Grace Road on Saturday where Leicester pulled off an amazing win against Surrey, by taking three wickets in the final over of the game to win by the closest of margins, just one run. How Surrey, who were strolling to victory, managed to lose this game I will never know. Full marks to Leicestershire for sticking at it despite Gavin Griffiths, who bowled the last over, missing two clear run out chances. Yet another cliff hanger to add to the collection we have been able to watch thanks to the wonders of live streaming.

Finally yesterday produced another fine victory for Durham against Essex at Riverside, almost entirely due to Alex Lees splendid 126 not out, after yet another youngster 22 year old Feroze Khushi had made a maiden century for Essex. Derbyshire and Yorkshire were reduced to a ten over slog at Queens Park Chesterfield and here it was big hitting Will Fraine, with a little help from Will Luxton, who saw Yorkshire take advantage of batting second to secure a fairly easy victory, which should help them to qualify for the final stages. Action all the way with plenty more to come.