County cricket returns

 Posted by Tony Hutton

For those of us suffering from a sort of overkill of Test cricket, from both the West Indies and Pakistan, where the endless chatter of the ever increasing number of commentators and summarisers often leads to a sort of numbness of the brain, relief is at hand. Today saw the first games of friendly cricket between counties preparing for the forthcoming season. The sun shone and a full morning's play took place at Taunton, Canterbury and Southampton.

The added bonus has been the live streaming from the first two games with no commentary whatsoever. The games proceeding in total silence. Full scorecards are available on the live.nvplay website, so the spectators can try and work out what is happening for themselves. No adverts, no irrelevant conversations, but identifying the players can sometimes be a bit of a puzzle.

Warwickshire's Henry Brookes bowling to Daniel Bell-Drummond.

The non-striker on the above rather poor picture is labelled as Jack Leaning, recently appointed vice captain of Kent and actually captaining them in the current game. When he appeared to be batting left handed I became somewhat suspicious and when he removed his helmet it clearly was not Leaning. The nvplay scorecard told me it was in fact Ben Compton, grandson of the great Dennis, and recently arrived from Nottinghamshire.

Will Rhodes bowling to Compton (not Leaning).

The Warwickshire wicketkeeper was wearing a shirt with the name Sibley on his back. Sibley, remember him opening for England not long ago, was not even listed as playing in the game and it looked more like the bulky shape of regular wicketkeeper Michael Burgess. New recruit Alex Davies, from Lancashire, obviously playing as a batsman. However good to see everyone back in action with former Yorkshire players Hannon-Dolby and skipper Will Rhodes getting a bowl before lunch. Kent were progressing nicely just after lunch at 83-0.

Meanwhile at Taunton, with a slightly different camera angle, Somerset were batting against Glamorgan. Lammonby and Green put on sixty for the first wicket and the latest there is currently 93-2. Good to see Harris, returning from Middlesex, bowling for his native county again. Glamorgan also now have Sam Northeast among their ranks and they will be looking for more runs from Billy Root in the coming season.

At the Ageas Bowl, no live streaming to be found, but Gloucestershire were batting and currently have 95-4 on the board. Wickets for Fuller, Currie and the ever reliable Barker for Hampshire already. Charlesworth, Bracey and Hammond all making useful contributions already for Gloucester.