Derbyshire’s final game of the 2017 season sees them take on Gloucestershire at The Brightside Ground, Bristol.
Heritage Officer, David Griffin, looks at the statistical background to games between the two sides at Bristol.
Starting on Monday 25 September, this will be latest date Derbyshire has ever begun a first-class game of cricket, with the previous latest being 24 September in 2008 and 2013.
The two sides have met previously on 130 occasions at all venues, with Derbyshire winning 31 games, Gloucestershire winning 48 games, with 49 draws, one abandonment, and one tie – the only such result in Derbyshire’s history.
That remarkable game took place at Bristol in 1987 when, with one ball remaining in the match, all results were possible. Unusually, Derbyshire had opened the bowling in Gloucestershire’s second innings with Michael Holding, and off spinner Rajesh Sharma, who took a career-best 6-80 and 9-143 in the match.
The sides have met at Bristol on 34 previous occasions, and have also played one match at both The Greenback Ground, Bristol (1928) and The Imperial Athletic Ground, Bristol (1962).
The most five recent games at Bristol, have resulted in two wins for each side, with the other match ending in a draw.
Derbyshire’s highest total at Bristol – 545-9 declared – is their highest-ever against Gloucestershire anywhere, and included the highest individual score at Bristol, 227 by Martin Guptill. Guptill’s innings was one of the finest in recent years and included 11 sixes, a record number by a Derbyshire player.
Australian, Travis Birt, enjoyed his visits to Bristol, scoring three hundreds in two visits, with hundreds in each innings of the game in 2007. There have been a further 19 centuries scored for Derbyshire at Bristol, with Steve Stubbings getting two, and the most recent being those scored by Chesney Hughes and Wayne Madsen in the corresponding fixture in 2016.
One of the most remarkable games in Derbyshire’s history took place in 2010 when Derbyshire were bowled out for 44 on the first day, and won the game before tea on the second.
Adrian Rollins also scored a double hundred at Bristol, carrying his bat for exactly 200 in 1995, only the second Derbyshire player to do so at this ground – Arnold Hamer achieving the feat twice.
The legendary Wally Hammond made the highest individual score at Bristol in these games – 237 in 1938.
Amongst the bowlers, Cliff Gladwin’s 7-28 in 1958 remains the best analysis for Derbyshire, while more recently, three bowlers have taken five wickets in an innings this century; Graeme Welch, Graham Wagg and Mark Footitt. Footitt’s 6-94 supplemented Guptill’s 227 in Derbyshire’s last win at Bristol in 2015.
