Sussex CCC previewed

Yesterday I went to the county ground at Hove for a coffee with Tony Cottey, the ex-Glamorgan and Sussex cricketer who now is charge of business development, to renew my subscription for the Players Club. Tony played for the county from 1999 to 2004 and it’s rather attractive that business development at Brighton Football Club, overseen by ex-skipper Paul “Dodge” Rogers, and at Sussex CCC, are in the  hands of ex-players.

We are all confident that Sussex will perform better in the shorter version of the game. Jayawardene has been recruited for the first seven matches and the 37 year Sri Lankan has an impressive record at every level of the game. Sir Lanka the current twenty/20 World Champions  have mastered both the test and limited overs format in a way England has not. We are hopeful that alongside Irishman Ed Joyce, who had a successful World Cup recently, Luke Wright who skippers the twenty/20 team and all -rounder Chris Jordan who is centrally contracted we have the fire power to post a big total.

Over the years the subcontinent has served us well. Three Indian princes captained the team: Ranji, Duleep and the Nawab of Pataudi. From Pakistan came Imran Khan, for me the best cricketing brain of that vintage crop of all rounders – Hadlee, Botham, Kapil Dev – and of course spin magician Mushtaq Ahmed was one of the man factors for our recent three title successes.  So Jayawardene is in good company.

I spent a happy hour reading A Pictorial History of Sussex and culled from it is my greatest Sussex team based only on players I saw:

John Langridge,  Ken Suttle, Murray Goodwin, Ted Dexter, Nawab of Pataudi, Chris Adams, Imran Khan, Jim Parks , Tony Pigott, John Snow, Mushtaq Ahmed.

Alan Oakman, Paul Parker, Matt Prior andTony Buss were all given serious consideration and were unlucky not to make the Conway team.