Nottinghamshire Director of Cricket Mick Newell told Wednesday’s Members’ Forum that he has tasked the players with securing a top four finish in the LV= County Championship this season.
Newell was responding to questions about the consistency of performances in the competition in an open forum that also gave supporters the chance to pose questions to Chairman Peter Wright and Chief Executive Lisa Pursehouse.
“We haven’t managed to take 20 wickets since the win over Surrey and the reasons for that are that we haven’t been able to get Andre Adams on the field often enough and our spin bowling hasn’t been threatening enough,” said Newell.
“We’ve been exposed on turning pitches and it is something that we need to address." Mick Newell
“We’ve been exposed on turning pitches and it is something that we need to address along with the need to find a consistent opening pair.”
Newell was also asked for his thoughts on the balance between developed and recruited talent in the squad.
“More than 40% of our players are from the area but young people in Nottinghamshire need to realise that this is a difficult side to break into and being from the county isn’t enough,” he said.
“I want more players to break through and to be good enough to stay in the team and Jake Ball is a good example of that because he’s earned his place on merit and proved to be a key member of our squad in one day cricket.”
In response to questions about ticket technology, Lisa Pursehouse confirmed that access control measures and print at home ticketing for web buyers will be introduced in time for the new season.
“We’ve committed to installing an access control system which will be the foundation of modernising our processes and allow us to make further improvements to the way in which we sell tickets,” she said.
“Members will always receive priority access to international tickets and our aims are to raise our membership numbers beyond 10,000 and to find an effective way to reward loyalty.”
Lisa confirmed that while no major ground developments were planned ahead of the 2014 season, investment would be made to upgrade facilities in response to supporter feedback. She also explained the stewarding processes that were in place to manage crowd behaviour and alcohol consumption during major matches.
Peter Wright gave outline details of the structure of the 2014 domestic season with twenty20 matches set to staged predominantly on Friday nights with a two-division 50-over competition replacing the YB40. The match schedule for England’s international calendar in 2014 is yet to be confirmed.