MATCH PREVIEW: Lancashire Lightning v Birmingham Bears
The Lightning have made an extremely encouraging start to their Blast campaign, winning two out of their first three games - against Durham and Derbyshire at home.
Lancashire Lightning v Birmingham Bears
Vitality Blast, North Group
Friday June 7, 2024, 6.30pm
Emirates Old Trafford
They sit atop of the North Group standings, level on four points with their next opponents, Birmingham Bears, who do have a game in hand and have won two from two.
A victory over the Bears in this one will put the Lightning in an excellent position, even at this early stage.
Birmingham have beaten Durham away and Nottinghamshire at home so far.
Like the Lightning, Alex Davies’s side were beaten quarter-finalists last year, and the two counties have also won this competition once apiece. Birmingham actually beat Lancashire en-route to their title in 2015. Lancashire were, thankfully, celebrating a year later.
Opposition:
Birmingham head to Emirates Old Trafford with a distinct Red Rose flavour to their side, with captain Alex Davies joined by fast bowlers Hassan Ali and Richard Gleeson, the latter who swapped counties over the most recent winter.
The Bears have gone seven years without a Finals Day appearance, their last in 2017. Given they host English Cricket’s showpiece occasion, they will be particularly desperate to put that statistic to bed.
And they certainly have the quality to do so.
They have two Pakistani overseas fast bowlers in their ranks.
Joining Ali, who played Championship cricket for Lancashire at the start of 2022), is Aamir Jamal. The latter hasn’t played at the start of the Blast following injury, though he was in the squad for Saturday’s win over Nottinghamshire, by 22 runs defending 150.
Ali has struck five times in two matches so far, while opener Rob Yates has scored their only fifty - 68 in the Notts win.
Spin trio Danny Briggs, Jake Lintott and Dan Mousley are experienced and emerging talents respectively.
Lancashire fans know all too well the capabilities of Davies and Gleeson, while Sam Hain and Chris Benjamin are batting dangers. They have also signed one-time England T20 international all-rounder George Garton on a T20 only contract.
Opposition player to watch:
Dan Mousley is one of English Cricket’s brightest all-round talents, as Josh Bohannon and Keaton Jennings will tell you.
The Lancashire pair played alongside Mousley for England Lions on their tour of India in January and February.
Mousley, 22, is a left-handed middle order batter who bowls very handy off-spin, as three wickets in Saturday’s home win over Nottinghamshire suggests.
More so, he was their leading wicket-taker in last season’s Blast with 21, including 3-13 in an Edgbaston win over Lancashire.
Over the winter, he played briefly for both Peshawar Zalmi in the Pakistan Super League (one match) and for MI Emirates in the UAE’s ILT20. He played twice for the latter and helped them win the trophy.
He is a key member of the Birmingham Phoenix squad in the Hundred, and he may well be a name England fans get used to in the coming years.
Previous meeting:
Birmingham won the only meeting between these two in last season’s North Group, by seven wickets at Edgbaston at the end of May.
Unfortunately, a one-sided affair saw the Lightning bowled out for 98 inside 15 overs having elected to bat, with all 10 wickets falling to spin, including four for the left-arm spin of Danny Briggs, three for Dan Mousley, two for Jake Lintott and one for Glenn Maxwell.
Steven Croft top-scored with 22 as wickets fell regularly.
In reply, Alex Davies opened the batting and posted 51 not out off 39 balls, sharing 50 inside seven overs for the first wicket with Rob Yates, who added 30.
In keeping with the spin-friendly conditions, Matthew Parkinson, Tom Hartley and Luke Wells all struck in the Bears chase - completed with 5.4 overs remaining.
What they said:
Australian all-rounder Chris Green knows he’s under pressure to perform for Lancashire in this season’s Vitality Blast - because people can’t stop telling him about it!
Green, one of Australia’s leading all-time spin bowlers in T20 cricket, has made an impressive start to life with the Lightning, helping them to two wins from three and to the top of the North Group table as a result.
The 30-year-old has taken six wickets with his off-spinners, including a superb 4-12 in Sunday’s win over Derbyshire at home, added to scores of 31 not out and 22 not out in the lower middle order.
“Everyone keeps reminding me how good the home record is and how important it is to be a spinner and bowl well here at Emirates Old Trafford,” smiled the Sydneysider.
“I know I’m under pressure to do well.
“As games go on, hopefully with used wickets, it’s about being really smart.”
Not that he’s too bothered about that pressure.
“I’m living my dream, playing cricket, travelling the world, it’s an absolute ball,” he said.
Green is an experienced campaigner, a veteran of 203 career appearances in this format. Our How’s Stat section tells you more.
So he knows exactly how to deal with such pressure on his shoulders and the ups and downs which come with this fast-paced - anything can happen - format of the game.
He said: “In T20 cricket, you’re going to have good days and go for 10 an over and poor days when you take wickets.
“It can be a rollercoaster.
“You take the good with the bad and enjoy the ride.”
And, he insists, that works just as much for the team as it does for individuals. Therefore, he insists, Lancashire can’t afford to rest on their laurels following their encouraging start.
He added: “It’s important not to get too far ahead.
“It’s still early in the tournament, and we just have to take it one game at a time and hopefully put ourselves in a good position for the back end.
“I’m a big believer in you’re not going as well as you think you are when you’re going well and you’re not going as poorly as you think you are when you’re going badly. It’s just about staying as level as possible and keep enjoying it.”
How’s Stat!
Chris Green has 170 wickets in T20 cricket, and only two Australian spinners have taken more in the history of this format; Adam Zampa with 299 and Fawad Ahmed with 172.
On that basis, with both Zampa and Ahmed being leg-spinners, Lancashire’s new overseas signing Green is the most successful finger-spinning Aussie in T20 cricket.
When going down the list of all-time leading Australian wicket-takers in this format, it was somewhat of a surprise that the vast majority are fast bowlers.
In all, Green is 16th on a list headed by AJ Tye with 332.
James Faulkner, a member of the Lancashire team which won the 2015 Blast title, is fourth with 262.