Glamorgan travel to Derby for their next contest in the LV=County Championship with the four-day game scheduled to start at 11.00am on Sunday, July 20th.
Match Preview
Defeats against Worcestershire at New Road and against Surrey at Colwyn Bay have seen Glamorgan slip to sixth place in the table, whilst Derbyshire - who beat Gloucestershire at Cheltenham on Thursday afternoon - lie in eighth place. Derbyshire were relegated last summer from Division One, but the Peakites have a handsome recent record in Championship cricket against Glamorgan having won five of their last six games against the Welsh county, as well as being victorious on the last three occasions that the two sides have met at the County Ground. In fact, Glamorgan have not beaten Derbyshire in their last twelve meetings in the LV=County Chamnpionship.
In 2012 Derbyshire won by eight wickets, whilst in 2011 they were victorious by 186 runs. In 2010 they won again by eight wickets in what proved to be an extraordinary game which featured record-breaking tenth wicket stands as the last pair on both sides each posted century partnerships. For the Welsh county, it was James Harris and Will Owen who shared a stand of 121, but their stirring efforts were to no avail as Derbyshire recorded another victory over the Welsh side at their headquarters.
Glamorgan's most recent Championship victory at Derby came in 2006 when Mark Cosgrove, the left-handed Australian struck a career-best 233 in a furious assault on the Peakites bowling which helped to set-up a six-wicket victory for his side.
There are also some personal landmarks looming on the horizon with Will Bragg, having so far amassed a personal-best seasonal aggregate of 905 runs in first-class cricket so far this summer, needs just a further 95 to reach 1,000 for the first time in his career. If he reaches this milestone during the course of the game he will be the first batsman since Mike Powell in 2006 to reach a thousand first-class runs for Glamorgan before the end of July, and the fastest overall for the Welsh county since Steve James reached the landmark on July 16
th, 1997.
Four batsmen have already reached the thousand run landmark this season - Hampshire's James Vince (1154), Worcestershire's Daryl Mitchell (1040), Yorkshire's Adam Lyth (1017), and Nottinghamshire's Samit Patel (1001), whilst Somerset's Marcus Trescothick (982) and Middlesex's Chris Rogers (934) are the only other batsmen in the country with more first-class runs this season than the Glamorgan southpaw.
Michael Hogan also has 40 first-class wickets to his name and the tall fast bowler requires a further ten victims to reach the fifty-mark for the second time in his county career.
Team News
James Harris is set to play his first LV=County Championship match for Glamorgan since August 28
th, 2012 having re-joined Glamorgan on a month's loan from Middlesex. The seamer claimed 204 first-class wickets for Glamorgan between 2007 and 2012, and he is set to add to this tally having replaced Ruaidhri Smith, who has a stress fracture in his foot, from the squad who were on duty for the match against Surrey at Colwyn Bay.
Another change to the squad from the match in North Wales sees young off-spinner Kieran Bull, who has been in excellent form for Glamorgan 2
nd XI, replace Andrew Salter in the following 12-man party for the match against Derbyshire at Derby: JA Rudolph, WD Bragg, MW Goodwin, CB Cooke, BJ Wright, J Allenby, MA Wallace (wkt and capt), JAR Harris, DA Cosker, KA Bull, WT Owen and MG Hogan.