Head of Cricket, Dave Houghton, says that Derbyshire’s defeat to Durham in the Specsavers County Championship should not deter them from playing the style of cricket that they have this season.
Durham claimed a 29-run victory in a game that was closely contested over the course of all four days, the hosts dismissing Derbyshire for 238, despite 71 for Matt Critchley..
Positive scoring after tea saw Derbyshire hit 130 runs in under 33 overs to give themselves a chance of winning the game, before four quick wickets saw the hosts win at Emirates Riverside.
Houghton admits that the loss is tough to take, but believes that the cricket Derbyshire are currently playing will bring results in the long run.
“It was never going to be easy, and we lost four wickets in seven balls, so the boys are pretty down but we are playing a really good brand of cricket at the moment,” said Houghton.
“This one didn’t go our way, and it doesn’t feel great losing but we have to make sure that we continue to play this brand of cricket all the time, to give ourselves a lot of chances to win.
“It is a long time to bat, and I think we were maybe a little bit slow in getting up to tea, but we wanted to get to tea with wickets in hand so that we could give it a real good go.
“On this wicket, as it turns out, we probably would have been better being more positive from the start, because as the ball got older, the wicket played a little harder and it stayed low. A lot of those wickets at the end were from balls that shot through really low.”
Matt Critchley top-scored in both innings for Derbyshire, with an unbeaten 79 in the first, before hitting a 97-ball 71 on Day Four.
Houghton praised Critchley for his performance, as well as that of Alex Hughes, who scored 40 in the second innings.
“His [Critchley] was the crucial wicket, and I thought that he played beautifully,” added Houghton.
“Alex Hughes played well as well and we moved Leus du Plooy up the order to have that left hand, right hand combination to make use of the shorter boundary.
“There were a couple of key partnerships there that put us so close to winning.”
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