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    Taylor's tours keep brothers in action

    23 February 2018

    Two red ball centuries and a scale of fitness that is better than ever have been the positives of time in Australia for Gloucestershire's cricketing brothers Jack and Matt Taylor.

    As Britain prepares for an untimely cold snap, the pair are acclimatising to being back home after spending a big block of the winter playing grade cricket down under.

    For Jack, it was a return to Kingston Hawthorn CC in Victoria, while Matt was at the Mount Lawley District club in Perth in his first off-season away from the Brightside Ground.

    "Mount Lawley is Michael Klinger's club and so he helped me with the arrangements to go there" Matt told the website.

    "I had spent the last four winters in Bristol and I wanted to try something different. Both Jack and I played a mix of T20 and 50 over cricket before Christmas, and then some red ball matches earlier this year which are spread over two weekends. It's good standard club cricket, similar to the Western League over here."

    Matt bowled 165 overs in all formats, taking 24 wickets, and also had the chance to take part in some net sessions with both Western Australia and the Perth Scorchers.

    "Control was one of the things it was good to work on" he continued.

    "If the pitch is flat and the ball isn't doing anything you have to be patient and work in an area for a long period of time. You have to be more specific, and I also tried to use the crease more to create angles which would uspet batsmen. We trained on Tuesday and Thursday so I was able to get my gym and fitness work done around that and my body, touch wood, feels the best it's ever done."

    The brothers met up for a fortnight in Melbourne over Christmas, and spoke most days about how they were getting on. Jack's centuries both came in the longer games played since the turn of the year, and it enabled him to become comfortable with the idea of playing solely as a batsman this summer.

    "It was quite strange initially but I'm ok with it now" Jack said.

    "The focus this season is on the batting, but I still see myself as someone who wants to bowl so I've been doing some bowling drills because I am looking to get that fixed up when the time comes."

    "My major contributions for the last three seasons have been with the bat and I would like to get as high up the order as possible, although that's not yet been discussed. Where I bat has to work for the team and we have quite a few all-rounders. If I stay at no 7, then that's where I've been before, but I would be aiming as high as no 5."

    Jack's statistics show 469 runs at an average of 33 across the winter, and he now heads into a busy and exciting year personally, with a wedding to look forward to at the end of the season. He and Matt may have been 1,700 miles apart for the past four months, but they are now re-united with a domestic summer hurtling headlong towards them.

    "We've both been in touch with S&C coach Bob Smith throughout the trips" Matt added. "He relates my work as much to bowling as he can and it's been really beneficial."

    It was certainly a more traditional closed season for the pair, while those based at home were doing a diverse but hopefully effective programme building that invaluable platform of fitness for the months ahead.

    "The excitement really starts once you are back outside" Jack concluded. "I've only been home for a few days but everyone is keen to get into things now. It feels like the season is almost up us."

    On the basis of the forecast, though, it could be the weather for three sweaters for a while yet.

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