Less than 48 hours after the thrilling climax to their County Championship tussle down at Taunton, Surrey and Somerset are set to resume their rivalry up at Edgbaston on Saturday, with a rematch of their T20 Blast semi-final from 12 months ago.
And despite his club’s disappointment on both occasions, Surrey’s T20 captain Chris Jordan insists there’ll be no hangovers from either, as they continue their quest towards what could yet be a glorious double-winning season.
“Over the last few years especially, this fixture has produced some exciting, competitive results,” Jordan told ESPNcricinfo. “It’s ironic that in the week leading into Finals Day, we’ve been playing against the exact same team.
“Any road to the final is never easy, and at some point you have to beat the best team. Obviously, they’re defending champions, and deservedly so, so we’ll need to be right on it. But it’s always hard-fought battles, and the team that plays best on the day normally wins this particular encounter, so we don’t see it being any different.”
It will, however, require a very different tempo from Surrey, and a swift transfer of mindset, after their attempts to park the bus at Taunton and block their way to a potentially title-sealing draw backfired in spectacular fashion. Despite Dom Sibley’s doughty 56 from 183 balls, their resistance was swept aside in a stunning collapse of 7 for 14 in 18.1 overs, by Somerset’s latest spin pairing, Jack Leach and Archie Vaughan.
“It can be tough, but the best players just make the switch,” Jordan said. “The main thing is it’s a mindset shift, your technique is not going to change too much between formats. You just have to assess the situation and the conditions and decide what approach to take. I don’t see it as being too different. With the type of multi-format cricketers we have, they can do it quite effortlessly.”
Sibley is perhaps the case in point for Surrey. Only days prior to his Taunton rearguard, he had been the toast of the Kia Oval after his scintillating 67 from 48 balls provided the impetus that Surrey needed to hunt down Durham’s target of 163 in their Blast quarter-final. It was an innings that defied the reputation he made for himself during his stint as an England Test opener, not least with an eye-catching reverse-scoop for six over deep third, but Jordan said it hadn’t come as a surprise to his team-mates.
“It was an unbelievable knock, but well deserved, because he’s been working so hard on his power game since he came back to Surrey,” Jordan said. “He’s a lot more expansive, but his batting in the powerplay has been key, because this year the brand-new white ball has been doing a bit more than normal. He’s just played some good cricketing shots, with a good technique, and that quarter-final was a great template for him. His tempo was really good, and it helped us to control that chase.”
“We’ll have a few changes to the line-up but that’s been the theme of the season. We’re blessed with a squad where so many of our guys are internationals, so we’re trusting the team to get the job done”
Chris Jordan on Surrey’s absent England quartet
Sibley’s poise could be all the more important to Surrey given the personnel they will be missing on Saturday. Despite the welcome return of three of the four players who featured in the Sri Lanka Test series – with Gus Atkinson missing out after suffering a niggle during that match – Surrey’s line-up will be shorn of some serious firepower, with Will Jacks, Sam Curran, Jamie Overton and Reece Topley all out of the picture due to their involvement in England’s T20I series against Australia.
It’s a situation that Tymal Mills, Sussex’s captain, last week described as “stupid”, as he faced up to the prospect of losing Jofra Archer for his team’s Finals Day campaign, while Alec Stewart – Surrey’s ongoing director of cricket – last year decried the ECB’s so-called Super September as “anything but”. However, Jordan took a more phlegmatic approach to the sport’s ongoing fixture congestion.
“Obviously, we’ll have a few changes to the line-up but that’s been the theme of the entire season,” he said. “We’re blessed with a squad where so many of our guys are good enough to get international accolades, so we’re trusting all the guys to go and get the job done.
“There’s a lot to take in as captain, but I always knew what I was getting myself into. It can be challenging, but my mindset is just to find solutions. Obviously Covid has set back a lot of schedules, so everyone is playing catch-up, and for me, personally, I know from being involved in an England set-up that country comes first.
“International games are very high intensity, so to release players right in the middle of a T20 series, for a game the next day, would be quite tough, both mentality and on the body. It’s about that balance between giving the guys their best opportunity to perform in a England shirt, and having them available for one of the big days in our English calendar. It’s unfortunate, but we just leave it to the powers-that-be.”
It’s not just the international game that is encroaching on the county season, however. One particularly notable absentee will be Jason Roy, who has committed himself to playing for Trinbago Knight Riders in the CPL, having already missed much of the Blast group stage to play for Trinbago’s sister team, LA Knight Riders, in Major League Cricket.
It continues Roy’s steady drift away from the English game, following his decision in May 2023 to negotiate an early release from his ECB contract in order to be a free agent, but Jordan had sympathy for his former England team-mate, whom he recognises as a first-mover in the shifting world of T20 cricket.
“Obviously, it’s a little bit of an unusual scenario, but we’re in unusual territory as well, with so much franchise cricket and different opportunities popping up over the world.
“The cricket community as a whole hasn’t fully come to grips with the moving times,” Jordan added. “[Roy’s] taken his own decision in terms of his own career. He’s been a great performer for us, we would have loved to have him, but we also wish him all the best in everything he does, because it’s such a big part of the dressing room.”
On his own England ambitions, Jordan is realistic about the status quo. Despite a strong showing at the recent T20 World Cup – including a memorable hat-trick in front of his friends and family in Barbados – he recognises that, with his 36th birthday approaching next month, he is unlikely to be a part of the white-ball reboot under Brendon McCullum’s expanded remit as head coach.
“I’m the kind of person that likes to take a day at a time and control what I can control,” he said. “The England team is in a bit of a transition period, and at some point, I knew that stage would come. It doesn’t necessarily mean that the door is shut, but all I can do is play the cricket that’s presented in front of me, and try to do as best as possible.
“Coming off the World Cup, I was a little bit in and out of the team, so it was nice to come back and put in a few performances for Surrey and Southern Brave as well. But I’ll just try to do my job on Finals Day, which will be leading the team as best as possible, but also performing my role.”
Andrew Miller is UK editor of ESPNcricinfo. @miller_cricket