Chanderpaul shows class after early wickets

A sublime century from Shivnarine Chanderpaul has dominated a rain affected first day of the County Championship game at Derby.

After losing two early wickets, Chanderpaul showed all his class by batting at an unusually quick rate for the West Indies legend, as Derbyshire closed in charge on 232-2.

Heavy rain overnight and in the morning meant that the 12:00 start was delayed, with the outfield saturated. The groundsman worked hard and finally got the ground ready for action at quarter past 3. Derby won the toss and considering it was the same pitch used in the YB40 washout last night, Wayne Madsen had no hesitation in electing to bat first. The two to be left out of the 13 man squad were the rather unlucky Jon Lewis and spinner Gary Keedy.

 

Madsen’s decision didn’t immediately look vindicated, as off just the 5^th ball of the match Chris Tremlett bowled Chesney Hughes with a ball that jagged back. Billy Godleman started fluently but he edged Linley to de Bruyn when on 17 to confirm a good start from our bowlers, with Derby falling to 28-2. Gareth Batty would have wanted his side to capitalise on the positive start that they had made, but Chanderpaul had other ideas as he came out and took the attack to our bowling quintet.

The unorthodox left hander was racing along at just under a run a ball, finding the boundary at regular intervals and not allowing the bowlers to apply any pressure. Linley and especially Meaker were certainly not bowling at their premium best, with the pitch looking very easy paced and not even Batty himself could reduce the flow of runs. Chanderpaul went past his half century before the tea break, as Derbyshire started to take control of the day’s proceedings.

The partnership with Madsen comfortably went past the century mark early into the final session of the day, and the captain joined his overseas partner in going to a half century. Batty rang the changes but nothing was happening for any of the bowlers, with Tremlett, who had previously bowled tightly, going to the boundary on numerous occasions off the bat of the magnificent Chanderpaul. He didn’t relent and brought up his century with a 4 off Meaker, before bad light brought an early end to the day’s play.

After getting them two quick wickets early on, that was a disappointing performance from our attack. Yes, the pitch is obviously brilliant to bat on, but they couldn’t find a consistent line and length and apply pressure onto Shiv and Madsen. Like he has a couple of times already this season, Meaker failed to hit his straps in his opening spell, and after originally bowling economically, Chanderpaul took a liking to Trem.

With almost half of the day washed out, and Derby looking good for a sizable score, we need to break the unbeaten 204 run partnerships and make more early inroads tomorrow or risk being batted out of our biggest game of the season so far.