The Sunday morning skipper has to remember a few simple principles: cobble together 11 players, make sure they’re well matched to their opposition and try to ensure they have not consumed class-A drugs on the morning of the game
By Charlie Campbell for The Nightwatchman, part of the Guardian Sport Network
No cricket captain needs an ECB survey to tell him what he already knows – that playing numbers in England are in decline. The last game of the season is always the most important one for the amateur skipper. By then, up to half of your players will be deciding whether to play next year, whether they’ll put up with the aches, strains and strife that a full summer of cricket brings. But a decent team performance can erase untold painful memories from earlier in the season and a good individual one will banish all winter’s doubts. You just have to coax enough runs or wickets from those players to ensure you have a full team next year.
This is not a problem that the professional captain faces. Those at the pinnacle of the game can choose from the country’s 844,000 active cricketers – though realistically only the last 4,000 are in the running. The remaining 840,000 of us are making up the numbers. And despite these numbers, many amateur captains will struggle to put out a full XI every weekend. Mike Brearley’s The Art of Captaincy brilliantly describes the challenges that he faced on the cricket field when leading England to Ashes glory in 1981. But he never had to play with nine men.
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from Sport | The Guardian http://ift.tt/1ITAbXw
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