Nottinghamshire’s pre-season preparations continue to be held up by the poor weather sweeping across the country.
Following the cancellation of last week’s scheduled friendly against Northants at Lady Bay, the first-class match at Fenner’s has also been called off without a ball being bowled.
With the county championship campaign beginning next week, Nottinghamshire now have just a two-day friendly match at Leicestershire, beginning on Thursday, in which to get in some valuable outdoor match practice.
Following the news of the cancellation at Cambridge, Peter Moores remained philosophical. “We were expecting this, to be honest. We’d got our heads around this possibility after seeing the outfield yesterday but it’s unfortunate not to be able to get a competitive game in.”
“Going into this match we felt we were ahead of the game because our groundstaff had prepared some excellent practice wickets and we’ve been working hard outdoors at Lady Bay. All that followed on from a good tour of South Africa, but this means we’re probably just about where we should be at this stage.
“We’ll have a good practice at home on Tuesday now and hopefully we should be good to go at Leicester on Thursday and Friday. I’ve not spoken to Nicko (Leics Head Coach Paul Nixon) yet, but it’s a county ground and I would hope that we can get some cricket on there.”
The loss of an entire game means that Steven Mullaney must wait to officially begin his reign as club captain. “I don’t think this impacts anything at all,” said Moores. “He’ll take it as it comes, we’re all in this together, the squad is very together and it’s all about getting ready for Old Trafford next week.”
Moores did concede that it would be particularly disappointing for Tom Keast not to get on the field at Cambridge. The 19-year-old was in line for a first class debut.
He added: “Tom was excited about getting his chance, so this is a real shame but he’ll continue to work hard and be ready for when another opportunity comes along.”
Tom Moores is likely to replace Keast in the squad for the Leicestershire game. “He’s OK,” confirmed the Head Coach. “He was rested here (Cambridge) on the say-so of the physios but he’s pain free now and should be good to go. It was some bony stress in his foot but it’s now cleared up properly.”
Nottinghamshire play Leicestershire at The Fischer County Ground on Thursday and Friday before beginning their Division One campaign at Old Trafford against Lancashire on Friday 13 April.
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