Worcestershire Club Captain, Brett D’Oliveira, says there is much still to play for in the LV=Insurance County Championship and that there were plenty of positives to take from the narrow defeat against Glamorgan at New Road.
Worcestershire held the upper hand during the first half of the game, securing a first-innings lead of 132 thanks to Ed Barnard’s century and the fit-again Joe Leach’s career-best 6-44.
But an unbeaten 99 from Billy Root, after yesterday’s century by Colin Ingram, enabled their opponents to chase down a stiff 332 target and win by three wickets.
D’Oliveira said: “This whole red-ball campaign, we have shown the fight and determination, the things I asked for at the start of the year.
“I hope the spectators have seen that the passion and enjoyment of playing for this club, so long may that continue.
“We’ve got to take all the positives from this game because there were a lot of positives.
“We just didn’t quite get over the line, but if we keep putting ourselves in these positions, I’m sure we will win more than we lose.”
Regarding the Glamorgan game and performance, D’Oliveira, said: “It was an outstanding game of cricket and just unfortunate for us to be on the wrong end of it, I thought.
“I thought conditions were tough on day one and the first two days; the ball did quite a bit.
“For Ed (Barnard) to show that fight and courage to get us up to that total which was challenging for the Glamorgan guys, was excellent.
“Joe Leach was outstanding. I thought to come back from a bit of an injury and put in that performance was outstanding. I thought all the bowlers in the first innings were outstanding.
“Credit has to go to them. Billy Root played an outstanding knock to get them across the line as well as Colin Ingram yesterday.
“Then Michael Neser came in and, with a bit of experience, took the game out of our hands a little bit.
“Credit goes to our bowlers as well. They fought and fought all the way through and even the fielding, with Tom Fell taking an outstanding catch, are the sort of things you want players to be doing, so the right characteristics are there.”
