What is wrong with Surrey this season?

[Whips_off_the_bails]

Hi there. I don't really support a county side, though I turn out sometimes to see Hampshire as that's my nearest county championship side. I sort of follow them all and take an interest in individual players rather than one side. On the other hand, except for the real Surrey haters, it's alarming to see the former champions make such a dire start to the season. It can't be the absence of the Test/ODI players, because Surrey have had to cope with this for several seasons now. Is it Batty's captaincy? Hollioake was an inspirational leader. Or is it just bad luck? What do you think?

[Rich Greenfield]

Just hope it lasts until september

[Glamorgan Wanderer]

Their batsmen don't seem to be converting starts and their ageing bowling attack seems to be lacking penetration.

[Tom Partis]

i think their time has just come and gone. no one can remain at the top forever, and due to a combination of factors, surrey's dominance is coming to an end, much to the delight of many.

[Kirsty Harris]

[quote=Tom Partis]i think their time has just come and gone. no one can remain at the top forever, and due to a combination of factors, surrey's dominance is coming to an end, much to the delight of many.

Please, no

I think that Surrey have got off to a very bad start this season, but it's a bit early to be saying that Surreys dominance has come to an end. I think the side looks a bit unbalanced at the minute, and I do think Batty lacks confidence as Captin... he always seems to be asking Hollioakes advice when Surrey are fielding!

I'd like to see how things look in a month or so..

[Goatman]

I suspect that when Surrey's management, coaches and players being the serious preparation for the season they go:- "We can't possibly lose out this year". With so many test players going in and out of the side and a general assumpton that they SHOULD win they seem to lack either focus or team unity. I have heard people talk of the Surrey Swagger, and this is surely symptomatic. The Surrey management say that they diddn't underestimate the Irish. I don't believe this for one minute. You need conidence to win, but when this becomes lazy arrogance you will start to lose. In addition, they have packed thier books with players who almopst certainly are still hoping for test recalls, so those players who ARE available week in and out don't WANT to be!

Gloucs have done well in the cup competitions by focussing on this and have fantastic team unity. They are organised and united and play almost the same team in each game in any given competition, and they known they will only win if they work together and are at the top of thier game and they are focussed purely on the county competitions. Sussex won the championship by squeezing every last drop out of the players they have into a single competion. Again, they are united, thier team is consistent and constant and they are aware that anything less than 100% will lose them games. Though there are players on the verge of the test side, they do not give the impression of believing they by rights deserve to be in it in the same way, and remain focussed on the county competitions. At the other end of the championship last year, Yorkshire failed to get promotion in the same way. They were disunited, thier top players are usually absent and too many of the others (Kirby, Sliverwood, Sidebottom etc.) are looking to push thier own claims to play at a higher level rather than buckling down to play as a team. Northants on the other hand did get promotion not least because they have a team philosophy that gives them unity. They know that the team is being built around thier spinners, and they must compliment this for success to come. Though Brown and Swann occasionally get talked of as ENG players, they are a long way out of the reckoning and the teams players remain focussed on the counties. The teams that are being successful at the present are the ones that are most focussed, not the most talented. The big clubs should sit up and pay attention!

[Farmer Giles]

Hello Bails. I think there is quite a lot wrong with Surrey. To start with, the property prices are ridiculously high. Half the people living there are stockbrockers or merchant bankers, and the rest are pensioners. Apart from that, I can't see why the county side has declined so rapidly, except, as you say about my side Yorkshire, they are disunited. It doesn't help, also, to have your best players taken away ad infinitum for England duties, or be off with injury (Goughie for Yorkshire for instance).

[Kirsty Harris]

Farmer Giles

LOL That was my general impression of Surrey folk growing up in Surbition!!!

[Rachael]

Amen to there being quite a lot wrong with Surrey: I had to live there for three and a half years... and miss it like I would a hole in the head. South of Guildford (and even Guildford itself) is OK during the daytime on sunny weekdays in may and june.. mostly because the kids are all at school, the commuters are all at work and the ladies of leisure are doing whatever it is they do... but the rest of the time you just can't move for people: millions of the buggers... either sat in their cars on the parking lots that pass as roads.. or sat somewhere near their cars... generally holding forth at great length about the traffic horrors they had to endure getting to where they are... or worrying that the traffic horrors that await them will give cause for fulmination for the rest of the day / evening.

The only good news was that our £65,000 one bedroom (no garage) starter home (half a semi, with 12' of garden) sold for something like £112,500... which was the larger part of a 200 year old clay lump cottage set in half an acre of the prettiest valley in South Norfolk... disturbed only by the odd passing tractor and bit of farming.

None of which explains why Surrey have got off to such a poor start to the season... which has probably got more to do with the sorts of things Goatman mentioned.

[Farmer Giles]

Hi there Rachael. I used to visit friends who lived in Dorking. They emigrated to Australia and I don't blame them. Niceish town, but, then again, not. They used to say people in that part of the world don't know what's north of Watford. Frankly, you wouldn't get me south of Lincoln without a bit of a fight.