Geraint Jones’ August Blog

It’s been an up and down season, but the last few weeks have shown some real signs to be optimistic.

That win at Cheltenham in the County Championship could prove to be a real turning point in our season.

Following on from that, the last five Twenty20 games saw us get some real success after the first five didn’t go well at all.

Some fresh faces in those last five games, with the likes of Fabian Cowdrey coming in and doing exceptionally well , saw us play some really good cricket and the guys really gelled.

If we’d have won that game at The Oval against Surrey in what was a tight game, I think we could have gone on and won the last five. We proved what a good side we are on our day by beating Hampshire at their place.

Those wins have given everyone a glimpse of what we are capable of and what we can expect for next year.

Last week we headed off down to Worcester for what turned out to be a rain affected game and we got denied by the weather after getting ourselves into a good position.

If it had gone the full distance, we were confident we could have got a positive result from it and that would have jumped us up the league.

The good thing about our bowling line up at Worcester is that it was varied. You need that in games and Mitchell Claydon has come in and done well and complimented Davo and Callum Haggett.

It was also good to see Treddy doing well and getting five wickets on what wasn’t really a turning wicket.

Both Stevo and Ben Harmison scored some runs too, so that was pleasing and hopefully they will take that form into the remaining games of the season.

It can be frustrating when we have to keep coming on and off during games and the hardest part for us cricketers is knowing what to do to fill up our time.

I spent some time sitting down having a chat with Samaraweera about how you go about building an innings and batting mentality.

I think at the same time a lot of our guys in the dressing room were filling the time playing a game of charades. I am sure Keysey was leading the charge in that and I know Mitchell Claydon gets bored easily so he needs something like that to entertain him.

On the last day of the game, it just goes to show you can’t always believe the forecast as I tweeted in the morning that I thought we weren’t going to get any play at all.

In the end, we got a bit of play, but it wasn’t to be and we had to head home with the draw.

Since I last blogged it has been a busy time for the family. I celebrated my birthday, whilst Tom turned two and my dad was over for that, so that was good.

He was madly on his video camera whilst he was over so we’ve got some good footage to look through.

It was great to see my dad and he was over for my cousin’s wedding and we travelled up to North Wales together for that.

We had time to catch up properly and that’s always nice as it’s not quite the same on Skype.

The only thing with travelling with my dad and I’ve since found it with Treddy on the way back from Worcester is that my passengers keep falling asleep on me.

I tend to be chatting away, look over and find that they are fast asleep catching flies!

We head back to Worcester on Sunday after a good few days off and we’ll try and end our Yorkshire Bank 40 campaign with some wins and see where it gets us.

There is a chance we can still sneak through and after the Twenty 20’s I guess there is a chance people like Fabian Cowdrey will have put their names in the hat for selection.

We’re aiming for a great end to the season and for me personally I’d like to score lots more runs and it looks like I could be captaining the side some more as Treddy could be away with England at the end of the month.

I feel in good form, but the last couple of innings I have got out to nicking cut shots which is usually a strength of mine. I’m playing well and now I have got to capitalise on it.

In between the games we have played I have managed to catch up with the Ashes highlights. It’s a shame with all this DRS furore as there has been some fantastic cricket played.

Technology is dictating the paper headlines and in the end the weather dictated what could have been a fantastic end to that Third Test at Old Trafford.

The right result has been obtained though and it’s now down to England to not just retain the Ashes but go on and win the series in style.

Watching these games, it brings back memories and it’s hard to think it was eight years ago since I last played in an Ashes series at home.

They are all good memories and I had a chuckle in the dressing room the other day during one of the rain breaks when they showed the replay of that catch I took off Andrew Strauss’ leg at Manchester.

Shane Warne made a comment as to how he felt unlucky, because I caught it after the series I’d been having with the gloves. The good thing is I can look back and laugh.

England will need to have one eye on going to Australia and the big thing for me is that there isn’t a huge amount of time for them to prepare the propaganda like we had when we went over there in 06/07.

They’d plastered the buses with quotes about what they were going to do to us.

Winning this series 4-0 should hopefully take away any confidence Australia have going into the series out there.

Next week, between playing Northants in the Yorkshire Bank 40 on Tuesday night and the game we have got against Warwickshire at home on Thursday night, I’m going to be playing in a charity game for Demelza Hospice Care for Children and Teens Unite Fighting Cancer.

The game takes place at Leeds & Broomfield Cricket Club on Wednesday 14^th from 5pm and I’d love to see as many of you there as possible.

Entry is just £5 to get in with the proceeds going to the two charities and hopefully we’ll have a bit of fun whilst playing a game of T20.

Till the next time.

Geraint