Glamorgan meet Worcestershire in their next game in the Specsavers County Championship with the four-day match getting under way at the New Road ground at 10.30am on Tuesday, September 10th.
(writes Andrew Hignell)
With three games remaining, there is still everything to play for, especially as far as promotion from Division Two is concerned, but after their successive defeats to Middlesex at Sophia Gardens and Lancashire at Colwyn Bay, Glamorgan have slipped out of the top three in the Division Two table and currently occupy fourth spot.
The Welsh county will begin the game at Worcester five points behind third-placed Northamptonshire and nineteen behind second place Gloucestershire. But a most salient point when looking ahead at the schedule is that the West Country outfit will be meeting the East Midlands side at Bristol in their final Championship contest during the last week of September, when Glamorgan will be at Emirates Riverside meeting Durham.
Before that however, Glamorgan's next two opponents are Worcestershire, who will start the forthcoming fixture in ninth place followed by bottom club Leicestershire at Cardiff in a game , scheduled to start on September 16th. With the Welsh county meeting the two teams currently at the foot of the table, hopes remain high that Glamorgan can gain promotion into Division One for the first time since 2004.
Glamorgan were victorious on their most recent visit to New Road in June 2017 as they recorded a nine-wicket victory. Such an outcome had looked unlikely earlier in the match as Glamorgan ended the first day’s play on 76-6. But an action-packed second day saw the contest turned on its head as firstly Jacques Rudolph and Chris Cooke added 168 for the seventh wicket before the riposte continued in a spirited fashion as Andrew Salter and Lukas Carey added 124 for the ninth wicket with a flurry of savage blows. Michael Hogan then took 5/38 as Worcestershire’s batsmen capitulated to leave Glamorgan celebrating a victory inside three days.
Worcester was also the scene of a dramatic - and successful - game for the Welsh county in 2016 as Owen Morgan, Glamorgan’s night-watchman ,batted throughout the final day to guide his side to a five-wicket victory and at the same time to post his maiden first-class century. His efforts followed a fine bowling by Graham Wagg, who claimed five wickets in Worcestershire’s second innings to leave the visitors with a target of 277 from 105 overs.
Worcestershire had recorded emphatic victories over Glamorgan in their previous two meetings at New Road, with the game in July 2014 seeing the home side won by 249 runs after a century from Tom Fell, plus a twelve-wicket match-haul from Saeed Ajmal, the Pakistani spinner. Moeen Ali had been the star of the show for Worcestershire in the contest at New Road in 2013, posting a superb 250, with his efforts helping his side to enforce the follow-on as they bowled out Glamorgan twice before easing to an eight-wicket victory.