Chris Cooke and Michael Hogan have topped Glamorgan’s batting and bowling averages respectively in the Specsavers County Championship for 2017.
In his twelve appearances in the Championship, Chris Cooke amassed 695 runs at a healthy average of 43.43, with his tally including an unbeaten 113 against Nottinghamshire at The SSE SWALEC as he shared a match-saving unbroken partnership of 226 with Colin Ingram after Glamorgan had been forced to follow-on by the side who ended up winning promotion into Division One of the four-day competition.
Chris also played a key role in Glamorgan’s nine-wicket victory at New Road against Worcestershire who ended the season as winners of Division Two. Together with Jacques Rudolph, Chris added 168 before being dismissed for 93, with their efforts, plus a combative 80* by Andrew Salter - who ended the year with a season’s best tally of 619 runs - helping to lay the foundations of a decisive and match-winning lead on first innings of 114.
Nick Selman struck the most number of hundreds for Glamorgan in the Championship, with the opening batsman scoring 117 against Leicestershire at Grace Road, 116* against Durham at Swansea, 103 against Durham at Chester-le-Street and a career-best 142* against Gloucestershire at The SSE SWALEC. His tally of four centuries was only surpassed by Kumar Sangakkara, the veteran Sri Lankan, who scored 8 for Surrey and Daryl Mitchell, the opening batsman for Worcestershire who scored 7.
On the bowling front, Michael Hogan was the leading wicket-taker for the Welsh county in the Championship fixtures, with the Australian-born seamer claiming 50 wickets at the highly commendable average of 20.88. This was the third time that Michael had reached the 50-wicket mark having claimed 67 wickets in 2013 and 63 in 2014, although it should be noted that there were more Championship games in those seasons and Michael’s tally in 2017 came from just ten appearances.
Michael rounded off the summer with a career-best match return of 10/87 against Kent at Canterbury and on what proved to be the final morning of the season at the St. Lawrence ground he delivered a probing partnership with Lukas Carey – who himself ended 2017 with a career-best tally of 35 wickets – to snuff out the resistance in Kent’s second innings before the batsmen – led by Selman – saw Glamorgan round off their Championship summer with a five-wicket victory.
GLAMORGAN CCC – Averages in the Specsavers County Championship for 2017
Batting and Fielding
M I NO Runs HS Av 100/50 Ct/St
CB Cooke 12 21 5 695 113* 43.43 1/4 39
AG Salter 12 19 4 619 88 41.26 -/5 5
CA Ingram 12 20 2 672 155* 37.33 2/1 5
NJ Selman 14 26 2 872 142* 36.33 4/3 15
CAJ Meschede 6 8 0 290 87 36.25 -/1 2
KS Carlson 8 13 0 443 191 34.07 1/1 4
JA Rudolph 11 20 1 492 111 25.89 1/1 3
AHT Donald 11 20 1 487 66* 25.63 -/4 12
RAJ Smith 3 4 0 89 38 22.25 -/- -
TN Cullen 2 4 0 84 42 21.00 -/- 8/1
CR Brown 2 4 0 83 35 20.75 -/- -
LJ Carey 10 14 2 219 54 18.25 -/1 3
GG Wagg 3 6 1 93 33* 18.60 -/- 2
DL Lloyd 8 15 1 247 88 17.64 -/1 4
JR Murphy 4 6 0 97 27 16.16 -/- 1
M de Lange 11 17 1 254 39 15.87 -/- 5
MG Hogan 12 17 10 100 29* 14.28 -/- 4
WD Bragg 3 6 1 65 30 13.00 -/- 2
T van der Gugten 5 7 0 64 21 9.14 -/- -
HW Podmore 2 4 1 21 10 7.00 -/- 1
AO Morgan 3 6 0 28 17 4.66 -/- 1
Bowling
Balls M R W BB Av 5wI/10wM
MG Hogan 2224 84 1044 50 6/43 20.88 3/1
T van der Gugten 950 43 505 22 5/101 22.95 1/-
GG Wagg 360 10 206 7 2/14 29.42 -/-
LJ Carey 1629 49 1051 35 4/85 30.02 -/-
RAJ Smith 418 6 302 9 3/64 33.55 -/-
CAJ Meschede 756 18 450 13 4/61 34.61 -/-
M de Lange 2075 47 1315 34 5/95 38.67 1/-
AG Salter 934 12 646 14 3/60 46.14 -/-
DL Lloyd 414 7 320 4 2/37 80.00 -/-
Also bowled: CR Brown 24-0-14-0; CA Ingram 223-0-155-2; HW Podmore 169-3-124-3.