Skipper Roderick back to face Kent
22 August 2016
Gloucestershire captain Gareth Roderick will play for the first time since the Cheltenham Festival when Kent visit the Brightside Ground in Division 2 of the Specsavers County Championship on Tuesday.
Roderick injured a finger in the T20 win over Essex and has missed the defeats to Leicestershire and Sussex as well as the conclusion to Gloucestershire's season in white ball cricket.
There was further good news with Liam Norwell also being passed fit to play after being hit of the head while batting against Chris Jordan at Hove.
"We've had fitness checks on both of them over each of the last three days and they've come up fine" said head coach Richard Dawson, who also has David Payne available after illness. He replaces Benny Howell and Roderick's return is timely as Graeme Van Buuren has a side strain.
Squad :
Roderick (c), Dent, Tavare, Klinger, Marshall, Mustard, J.Taylor, Miles, Payne, Norwell, M.Taylor, Currill.
With only five games remaining - and only four for Kent - Dawson revealed that he believes all the teams trying to cut Essex's lead at the top of the table will be chasing the wins that could materially change the promotion picture.
"It has started already and in the last two rounds we've seen more positive results than there were in the early part of the season. We've spoken about being better in two key areas - making the opposition work harder for our wickets, and working harder ourselves to put the ball in the right areas to take wickets."
Kent arrive at the Brightside Ground 12 points ahead of Gloucestershire and with Will Gidman, on loan from Nottinghamshire, among their bowling options. Gidman took 71 first class wickets at Bristol during his time with Gloucestershire, and is likely to play alongside a debutant, the South African pace bowler Hardus Viljoen, who has signed until the end of the season.
"Kent chased down their target (241) on a pitch that flattened out on the last day when we played them at Bristol last year, and " Dawson went on. "They've played some good cricket this summer, and when we were playing well earlier in the season our team was relatively settled. We've had some injuries since then and there have been changes but it's about getting back to disciplined cricket."
Coverage :
You can follow the match via the live scorecard available on the website, or via Twitter @Gloscricket.
