Preview: Surrey v Warwickshire, County Championship (2023)

Stuart Barnes believes the dressing room will look to keep up the momentum they built in the latter stages of their LV= Insurance County Championship clash against Lancashire on to Tuesday’s match with Middlesex.

matc

2023-09-02T14:57:00.000Z

Preview: Warwickshire v Surrey, County Championship

West Indies opener Kraigg Brathwaite is set to make his Warwickshire debut as the Club returns to red ball action with a must-win game at LV= Insurance County Championship Division One leaders Surrey.

Brathwaite – who most recently captained the Windies in two Tests against India in July – flew into Heathrow on Saturday morning and is expected to slot straight into the side.

First Team Coach Mark Robinson and his team have spent the last few days scouring international batting options after established opening pairing Alex Davies and Rob Yates were both ruled out of the Oval clash.

Davies has not managed to recover from a back spasm, while Rob Yates is ill.

Chris Benjamin – who’s played eight First Class games for Warwickshire, including hitting 127 on debut – comes into the squad as he looks to make his first county start in 2023.

“He’s a proven run scorer in Tests and First Class cricket (34.89 and 39.33 averages) and will be a hugely valuable addition to the squad at the back end of the season.

“We got a phone call in to him to ask one, was he available, and two, does he fancy it, and thankfully on both counts the answer was yes.”

Preview: Surrey v Warwickshire, County Championship - Image 2

Robinson also confirmed that Jacob Bethell – who has been batting while managing a stress fracture in his back – will sit out the remainder of the campaign, and Liam Norwell will miss the rest of the season.

He added: “It’s devastating for Liam, he’s worked really hard and getting close to coming back to play but keeps getting reactions in his bulging disc.

“Beth has been feeling increasing discomfort in his back so we thought the best thing to do, for his long-term recovery, was for him to step out of these last four games.

“Rushy is alright, he came through the Seconds game, probably didn’t bowl quite as many overs as he would have liked but he’s in a good place and looking forward to getting to London and throwing some punches.”

Surrey sit top of Division One on 183 points – 56 ahead of Warwickshire but having played a game more – and have recently added India A batter Sai Sudharsan to their squad for the red ball run in.

The 21-year-old has an average of 42.71 in eight First Class games and starred in the Indian Premier League final hitting 96 off 47 balls for Gujarat Titans in their defeat to Chennai super Kings.

“This team has heart, it has bottle, and we’ll target Surrey to win the game and keep our league ambitions alive.”

Squad

Will Rhodes (C)Ed BarnardChris BenjaminKraigg BrathwaiteDanny BriggsHenry BrookesMichael BurgessSam HainOlly Hannon-DalbyJake LintottCraig MilesDan MousleyChris RushworthChe Simmons

How to Follow

Members and supporters can follow the match live in our Match Centre at edgbaston.com, which will include a free to watch Live Stream, with BBC commentary, and a live text commentary.

Supporters can get involved by sending their match day comments and thoughts on Twitter via @WarwickshireCCC and we’ll publish the best ones on our live text commentary in the Match Centre.

Supporters can also watch the Live Stream and get instant push notifications of all wickets, innings and match results via the Edgbaston app, which is free to download on iOS and Android.

Match updates will also be available across the Club’s social media accounts, simply search for @WarwickshireCCC.