The new LV County Championship season gets underway on Thursday and it does so with a full card which sees all 18 counties in action across the two divisions as the teams get to show their talents for the first time this term.
A number of squads have changed massively so we get the first chance to see who has recruited well and who hasn’t. As will be the case throughout the season, all of the matches will be live on YouTube on the county and ECB pages.
Division One
As a bonus to the County Championship this season with the TV deal for the IPL originally not looking like it was going the way of Sky Sports, they are showing a game in each of the opening three rounds. This week Surrey begin their title defence at away to the team who were their closest challengers last season in the form of a Lancashire side who very much had seconditis last term and will not want a repeat of such results this time around.
Four other matches take place in Division One with Hampshire entertaining the newly promoted Nottinghamshire at the Ageas Bowl. Kent and Northamptonshire survived for a second season of top flight cricket and they open up against each other in Canterbury while Essex will be the visitors to Lord’s to take on the other new boys of Middlesex. That leaves Somerset and Warwickshire and they will get it on in Taunton.
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Division Two
This is as wide open a Division Two as I remember in quite some time. Yorkshire are expected to do a bit of a job on the division and they get to put something of a marker down in those ambitions when they entertain Leicestershire in what could end up being the champions against the bottom side. Glamorgan and Gloucestershire are likely to have something to say about that and they do battle down in Cardiff in a competitive looking match.
Another competitive match looks to come from Derby where two squads that have undergone winter surgery meet when Derbyshire welcome Worcestershire to the County Ground. Both sides will want to be involved in the promotion mix this season so you suspect that this is a key game for each of them. The other match this week comes from Hove where anticipation is building ahead of the arrival of Steve Smith. Sussex will be the team he plays for next month but they will face Durham without him.
Betting
There looks to be a couple of bookmakers who have priced up a series of markets which is encouraging going forward. Hopefully some good in play options come up too and we can have a lot of fun over the course of the season. This is the first week of the campaign though and it is going to be cold and the pitches will be dead because a lot of rain has been around the UK in the last week so I’ll leave those markets for next week and beyond.
One bet I do like heading into these matches though comes from Cardiff where I think Gloucestershire are a huge price to beat Glamorgan. I wouldn’t think that if this game was next week because Marnus Labuschagne and Michael Neser will have arrived for duty but they are not here for this game and the Glamorgan attack in particular looks very light. Marcus Harris and Zafar Gohal have both been named in the Gloucestershire squad for this match as has Marchant de Lange so there is a much stronger feel about the Gloucestershire squad for this one. I don’t really see where Glamorgan get 20 wickets from naturally so if Gloucestershire bat smart the 13/10 on them has every chance of landing.
Tips
Back Gloucestershire to beat Glamorgan (DNB) for a 3/10 stake at 2.30 with William Hill
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