Mick Newell has named a 12-man squad for tomorrow's LV= County Championship home match against Yorkshire (11am start) and, the inability to turn dominance into victory aside, he's hoping for a similar Nottinghamshire performance to last time out against Middlesex. 

All eleven players that featured in the match at Lord's retain their place in the match-day squad. They are joined by Academy graduate fast-bowler Luke Wood, who is selected on the back of achieving match figures of 5-32 from 18 overs in the Second XI's victory against Essex.

Newell is aware that Yorkshire's ranks have been weakened by six international call-ups and the recent injury to former Notts' left-armer Ryan Sidebottom, but he insists that - against a side that eased to a ten wicket victory over Worcestershire inside three days last week - complacency couldn't be further from the minds of the Nottinghamshire side.

"They're a good side, they've got lots of depth - better depth than most people have got, which was shown by the way they beat Worcestershire," Newell said.

"There's no chance of them ever being underestimated when they come here, especially with the confident way they're playing their cricket at the moment. It's a huge challenge for us and it should be a good game."

While one Academy graduate in the shape of 19-year-old Wood was impressing at Billericay, another homegrown pace bowler, Jake Ball, was turning in a standout performance for the first eleven at Lord's with match figures of 4-93.

Although Ball lacks first-class experience in comparison to the likes of Luke Fletcher and Andrew Carter, Newell is in no doubt that the selection of the 24-year old was deserved - and he revealed that something of a rotation policy will be required during the course of a long county season.

"From the minute we landed in Barbados through to the pre-season match with Loughborough, Jake was the outstanding bowler, so he deserved to play and he will get lots of cricket this year," Newell said.

"He's probably been a bit of a slow burner. It's taken him a while to get to where he's got to.

"But he's got a lot fitter and stronger in the last two months. I would say he's put a lot of muscle and strength on and that's enabled him to bowl quicker.

"Some of the stuff he's bowling now, he's probably as quick as anyone in the team.

"It's very important that we share the work amongst the five, six, seven seamers that we've got because, unlike when we had Andre Adams and Peter Siddle here just playing red ball cricket, they all want to play in all forms of the game.

"Fletch will play lots of cricket and he understands, along with Harry (Gurney) and Jake as well, that they're not going to play every match because that just wouldn't be the way to get the best out of our players."

Whichever bowling unit takes the field for Nottinghamshire on Sunday, Newell is hopeful that his side can create a similar winning situation to the match against Middlesex, and this time turn it into a victory.

"The only negative was we didn't win the game," he said. "Everything else we did through the four days we did extremely well.

"We had 12-15 minutes on day one when we lost some wickets and that set us back but, apart from that, I don't have any complaints about it.

"I thought it was a terrific effort for the first game of the season. It's something to build on and we should be very pleased with that.

"The only area of disappointment is we didn't win the game because, if you're going to be in the top part of the table, you've got to win between seven and nine games, and that's one opportunity missed.

"But we did a lot of good things to create that opportunity and we've got to make sure we do that again."

Nottinghamshire squad to face Yorkshire (from): Jake Ball, Will Gidman, Harry Gurney, Alex Hales, Steven Mullaney, Samit Patel, Vernon Philander, Chris Read, Brendan Taylor, James Taylor, Riki Wessels and Luke Wood.

Yorkshire squad to face Nottinghamshire (from): Jack Brooks, Tim Bresnan, Karl Carver, Matthew Fisher, Andrew Gale, Andrew Hodd, Jack Leaning, Alex Lees, Steve Patterson, Cheteshwar Pujara, Richard Pyrah, Will Rhodes.

 

The excitement of the NatWest T20 Blast returns to Trent Bridge in May as Notts Outlaws hope to break the 10,000 barrier for the arrival of reigning champions Birmingham Bears on Friday 15 May.

Adult tickets are available at a special price of £10 and further discounts in place for under 16s (£5), under21s (£7) and senior citizens (£7) when buying in advance. Make Trent Bridge a firm fixture for your Friday nights and secure your seats now.