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So arriving very soon is another season of the thrash and bash of the T20 Blast competition. Notts Outlaws are the current champions after last season's comprehensive, professional and well orchestrated campaign, Peter Moores working his magic perfectly.
This season sees a new sponsor, Nat West replaced by Vitality, a private health care insurance provider - perversely during the NHS's 70 anniversary commemorations, but can Outlaws bank on similar fortunes to 2017?
Notts Outlaws have all the same players on their books that played in the 2017 campaign with the exception of Brendan Taylor, who top scored for the Outlaws in the final, but as Tom Moores has improved his batting almost on a game to game basis this season and Billy Root who has also gain further vital first team experience in 2018, the loss of the Zimbabwean shouldn't be too much of a blow.
On a bright note, Luke Fletcher should be back to send down his booming Yorkers after being absent for most of the 2017 Blast with his head injury and his namesake Luke Wood appears to be slowing some T20 consistency for the Seconds.
The two permitted overseas players remain the same, just a year older and wiser, skipper Dan Christian recently aka as Johnny Mullagh or Unaarrimin in the Aboriginal Commemorative tour and the Kiwi Ish Sodhi, a player who appears to remain calm when under fire but in spite of the success of 2017 still failed to get the majority of the Trent Bridge faithful to appreciate his talents and many will see his inclusion this year as someone blocking Matt Carter's (star of 2018 so far) opportunity to play once Outlaws have a full squad to choose from.
Certainly, Outlaws will be without key players, Alex Hales and Jake Ball whilst England entertain India in the ODI series. .
Will boundaries remain short and totals huge? If we had Hales and Ball they probably would be but in their absence...
Fancy us to be competitive, as you like you stare the squad is similar to last year, Tom Moores is a far better batsman and we hope Sodhi is better for last years run out. A good leggie is priceless in T20, only problem is Hales likely unavailability for half of the group games ?
ReplyDeleteWhat a waste of time all these Lions series, North v South games and Performance Programmes are! Many players actually turn down the chance to participate in them preferring instead to stay with their counties and play in what they perceive as more important and higher standard domestic competitions. Mullaney’s development (if in fact he is still developing) would have been much better served playing for Notts in the last two CC games and now in the T20 Blast.
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