PHILINFRANCE

Judging by Sri Lanka's score so far today - 12/3 off 4 overs - England should be able to just pick another allrounder, bowl first and have the match done and dusted by tea. It seems crazy to have TB withdraw from Somerset's T20 side, just when, finally, he was coming in to some form, just for him to sit in a bubble as cover for Malan, who is suffering from personal problems.

James Hildreth is in today’s squad.

Better late than never, but I have just seen the highlights. Pretty impressive innings from both TB and DC.

Thanks for that, although I assumed as the game was live on SKY, and, thus, Somerset were unable to stream it, the only choice was to get a stream from VIP/HesGoal - unfortunately, both were down, as was Cricinfo until the last few overs. Quite a shame, as, having watched some debacles this season, this appears to have been a batting master class from TB and DC.

Does anybody have a link, Please? It doesn't appear to be on HesGoal and the VIP connection doesn't appear to be working. Many Thanks in advance.

Pretty comprehensively, again ?. I must say, I am very impressed with this Glenn Phillips - I had never heard of him before his recent exploits with Glos.

I was just about to post saying/asking why, with no third man, does he persist in giving them 4 runs with every ball, when he gets a wicket - not a particularly good ball, but a wicket nevertheless and CDG to boot. To be fair to LG, he did bowl an excellent final over.

Tom Abell is out for (presumably) a few weeks, so who would you suggest?

I'm not sure. Perhaps they can ask Nick Higgs for some advice, as he has some experience of such matters.

A very enjoyable game and a wonderful win - a fantastic innings from James, especially after his (almost comical) first over facing Will Jacks. The bad news, however, and I haven't seen it mentioned on this thread, Tom Abell has torn his hamstring!

An excellent finish, to be fair.

And the Gillette Cup. Probably my favourite ever match was when Somerset beat Surrey (John Edrich, Robin Jackman, Geoff Arnold) at Taunton in the 1974 quarter final. Ian Botham played, but didn't bat, former England wicketkeeper, Jim Parks, played but didn't keep wicket, Brian Close and Sir Viv Richards only contributed a few runs each and the star was the unsung hero, 'Dashing' Peter Denning. A wonderful day out with more than 500 runs scored - a rarity back then. Also a lovely story about Hallam Moseley, but that is a different subject altogether.

I just popped on to CricInfo to see if there was any comment about the pitch or news about the teams. Not yet, but they have announced the two commentators: I'm Matt Roller, and I'll be joined by Vishal Dikshit to talk you through this one. I'm sure he will provide an insightful commentary and talk a lot of sense, though.

Oh, of course. I wasn’t disagreeing with you, simply noting that a batsman with perhaps a poor technique (at international standard) batted particularly well against Somerset.

Maybe, but it seemed to work against Somerset (unfortunately).

Some suggestion Broad was showing dissent. Everything is relative.... https://www.crictracker.com/shakib-al-hasan-uproots-the-stumps-to-show-dissent-at-the-umpires-decision-in-dpl-2021/

I was just looking at Surrey's scorecard for yesterday's match against Middlesex - a very impressive 20 over line up: Jason Roy, Will Jacks, the Curran brothers, JOVE and, of course, our old friend Gareth Batty. It should be an entertaining game this evening.

Firstly, I am a Somerset fan through and through - dating as far back as Bath and WSM festival weeks: does anybody on here remember walking up from the 'beach' to spend a lazy afternoon watching Fred Rumsey or even Bill Alley? I understand the piss-taking of young James Bracey, but bear in mind he is a young man and, I would imagine, extremely embarrassed at his batting performances in his first two Tests. Give the lad a break and just hope that he scores well in the second innings, but is out for a duck when he next plays against Somerset and drops a few catches/misses a few easy stumpings.

But excellent in the field every game, apart from this evening.

Jack Brooks, first start in T20, takes a wicket before conceding a run ?.

Are you lucky enough to be there, or watching on a stream?

Interestingly, Ben Green was top scorer with 43 NO (three sixes).

It's available here should anybody need it, unfortunately it is still 4 wickets down no matter where you watch it.

Is (was) anyone watching the live Somerset stream? My stream has just been cut abruptly, with a message saying it is for copyright reasons.