RLOD v Glos at Cheltenham Sun 24th July

Cachopa for Brown? Brown was our second top run scorer!

Well played Finch. I'm sure he owes it all to Murray Goodwin's inspirational spell as batting coach and, of course, should be hailed as a product of "Robbo's rich legacy".

Shame Goodwin didn't spend a bit more time coaching that infamously long tail to last more than a few deliveries.The last five wickets went down in 35 balls. Again.

Several of the top order batsmen seem to be going backwards, too - Cachopa most obviously but Machan ,too, it seems, while Salt isn't rerady to be thrown into the top three in such a struggling side. It's simply not fair on him.

The bowling is a similarly incoherent mess.. Just as Magoffin qualifies as non-overseas, he dips inexorably over the hill and is now Sussex's equivalent of David Masters. Mills was sold to Sussex on a false prospectus : Essex knew he was a crock if he had to bowl more than four overs but omitted to tell Sussex that. I've no idea what's going on with Shahzad. Is he first and foremost a white ball or a red ball bowler? Or is he both - or neither? I don't know and neither it seems do Davis and Wright. Hatchett seems to have disappeared off the planet ... as does Robinson. Garton and to a lesser extent Whittingham have to be wrapped in cotton wool due to Sussex's poor recent record in duty of care for its fast bowlers.

When it comes to spin, Briggs has been a huge disappointment and Beer hasn't made the advance we had all hoped for - which suggests it was more than just Robinson who was holding him back. And there isn't a proper offie apart from the reluctant Nash.

Even when it comes to keeping, the to-and-froing between Brown and part-time Cachopa creates further destabilisation. Cachopops is either good enough to be picked as a batsman or he isn't; he should not sneak into the side because he's an adequate stopper who with a fair wind might catch as many as he drops.

I fear s&f is right - this will go down as Sussex's worst season this millennium. It's as bad now as when Marlar/Piggot/May forced out the old guard almost twenty years ago.

Jim May is the only one left from that triumvirate and he needs to wake up and smell the linseed oil.

You're in charge, Jim. We know you read this forum so what are you going to do? You stuck with Robinson far too long and you appointed all these people who are failing to deliver. And I know you are aware of that because I was sitting with hhs in the row in front of you earlier this season, when (clearly unaware that we were there) you made some highly derogatory and very vociferous remarks to Comrade Filby about the lack of professionalism by certain Sussex personnel...

So I think it's time for you to do something about it, don't you? Because Sussex right now are at the kind of low point that persuaded you to mount the 1997 revolution all those years ago ...

Abysmal.

Salt has scored over 100 runs in his last two innings, before this one, so let's not start talking rubbish about him not being able to play in the top three. This is exactly the time he needs to be in the side, as with a host of other grads, now we're well and truly gone.

Wright doesn't know what he's doing I'm afraid, the order is constantly changing and nobody can settle. He's had a shocking first season as captain, and people had such high hopes.

If you look at the promising performances this season, it's mainly the youngsters. We can't just play them all, all the time, but we have to play them more, particularly Garton, who has hardly bowled since a pretty impressive start. Garton, Whittingham, Archer, Salt and Finch have all done pretty well, there's your core for the future. Now we're totally shot for the season, use them more.

As people are saying though, it's more than a few changes in playing personnel. It's horribly wrong at Sussex and most people on here would have picked it when the shifting of staff initially happened, but they wanted to be positive. We all knew it was a horrendous re-shuffling job all the way through the set-up.

Really? According to cricinfo he's not aggregated  100 in his last five innings - and he's scored one half century all season.

Which is fine. But my point was that he will develop much faster in a successful side in which the senior batsmen are setting a good example. Batting in the top three when the entire top order is run shy makes it very hard for him and it's hardly fair to to expect him - or Finch , come to that -to outscore their under-performing elders and betters.

He has in the RLC, which is what I meant.  In this comp, and the T20 to a certain extent, he's doing alright.  Everyone will develop better in a winning team BM but we don't have one.   I see that as a reason to play them rather than a reason not to.  With or without expectation, Finch today and Salt recently have outscored their under-performing elders in this comp and now we're out of it anyway, so what's the problem?   

We have a good looking good sized group of 19-22 year olds who are performing better than most seniors and our season has gone - play them as much as possible without running them into the ground, obviously.