The best day of the county cricket season has arrived as it is Vitality Blast finals day on Saturday and the first semi-final is a repeat of the second one from a year ago as for the second time this week Somerset go up against Surrey.
Somerset won an epic County Championship meeting between the two earlier in the week and they won that semi-final last year on their way to the title so Surrey have plenty of reason for wanting revenge in what should be a corking semi-final.
Where to watch
The match will be shown live and in full on the Sky Sports Cricket channel with the build-up beginning at 10.30am ahead of the 11am start time for this semi-final.
Surrey
Surrey were the top dogs in the South Group in the first part of the competition and then cruised past Durham in the quarter final despite letting Durham back into that match from a strong position. The record of Surrey isn’t the best in this competition though, especially when you stack it up against their recent Championship credentials for example, and you wonder if there is something in that. They won the inaugural tournament in 2003 but they haven’t got their hands on the trophy since then.
The big issue that Surrey have going into this semi-final is the turnover of players. England have snatched Will Jacks, Sam Curran, Reece Topley and Jamie Overton and Australia have Sean Abbott while Spencer Johnson isn’t around for the knockout stages either. Unlike in the Championship where Surrey were able to sign Shakib al Hasan, they have no overseas players at their disposal here. They do have Ollie Pope, Jamie Smith and Dan Lawrence back from England duty though.
Somerset
This is shaping up to be the biggest fortnight in the history of Somerset CCC as it is still possible that they win the treble from here. They have made the final of the Metro Bank One Day Cup, are just eight points behind Surrey in the race for the Championship title and are two wins from becoming the first team to ever defend this trophy. To be fighting on three fronts this late in the season tells us they are playing good cricket and have plenty of squad depth.
They had it easy in the quarter final because injuries killed Northamptonshire before a ball was bowled but you wonder if an injury to Tom Banton playing football of all things could hinder Somerset here. They are also going to be without Riley Meredith who is on international duty but they have been helped by England leaving them alone which means that the likes of Will Smeed, Tom Kohler-Cadmore and Tom Abell are all around still.
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Key Players
Jamie Smith pulverised this Somerset bowling attack when these two met at The Oval earlier in the competition and given how well he has been hitting the ball well for England since then you would fancy him to propel his side to a decent score here.
All eyes will be on Will Smeed to see if he can get Somerset off to a flyer in this match. There is no Tom Banton for this one so Somerset will need the other half of their exciting attacking opening pair to come good here.
Betting
I can understand why some bookmakers can’t split these two sides. I was actually hoping that they players that England have taken away from Surrey would have layers putting Somerset as the favourites but that isn’t the case. I actually think Surrey will win this match. The injury to Tom Banton is massive. He is their top scorer in the competition by 150 runs and he is going to be a huge miss. Somerset have cover but nothing that is international class like he is.
There is no getting away from Surrey not being as strong without Sam Curran, Jamie Overton and Will Jacks in particular but Overton was only playing as a batter and three of those have come back from England duty so they are going to bat a long way down. They still have enough good bowlers for this level. They could still line up with a seam trio of Tom Curran, Chris Jordan and Dan Worrall and there’s Jordan Clark as well. They have never been that strong in the spin department but in the opening semi-final I don’t see that being an issue. I’ve never been convinced by Somerset’s attack and the fact that Northamptonshire could take it for 198 in the quarter final you would think Surrey can do it enough damage to win this one.
Tips
Back Surrey to beat Somerset for a 3/10 stake at 1.91 with Bet365
