Smith top of MVP race

Tom Smith continued his fine start to the season with eight wickets in Lancashire's LV= County Championship loss at Durham to open up a large lead at the top of the overall and the LV=CC FTI MVP Rankings.

Smith took 3-90 and 5-42, his third five-wicket haul of the summer, to take his tally to 33 LV=CC wickets for the season and 35 across both forms.

He is his county’s leading LV=CC wicket-taker by some distance, with Simon Kerrigan the next most successful Lancashire bowler with 19 victims, and the all-rounder is also top of their run-scoring charts thanks to 477 runs including five fifties.

Smith scores his runs at the rate of a strike rate of 42 in the LV=CC but is able to change gear in the NatWest T20 Blast, where he has smashed 260 runs at the rate of 149 runs per 100 balls.

He boasts 23.3% of Lancashire's runs in the T20 Blast and is ranked third in the T20 FTI MVP. Smith's previous best finish in the overall FTI MVP was in 2010 when he came 12th courtesy of a fine T20 campaign, in which he came fourth.

Smith need look no further, though, than the two men directly behind him to know how tough it will be to hang on to top spot. Samit Patel and Darren Stevens, second and third respectively, are two of the most consistent performers in FTI MVP Rankings history.

No-one has scored more MVP points than Patel's 3566.30 since the Rankings began back in 2007 and Stevens is third on that all-time list. Patel has 950 runs and 19 wickets across both forms this term, while Stevens has been more successful with the ball than the bat taking 28 wickets to go with his 593 runs.

Like Stevens, James Vince loses 20% of his LV=CC points because they are scored in Division Two but a combination of sheer weight of runs and a terrific strike rate means the young Hampshire stroke-maker continues to be a force in this campaign.

This week it was Essex's turn to be put to the sword at the Ageas Bowl as Vince racked up 240 off just 222 balls in Hampshire's second innings to become the first man past 1000 Championship runs (1046) this term.

He has struck two other big centuries - 144 versus Gloucestershire and 159 not out against Surrey - as well as five fifties and three other scores above forty. Vince has scored 21.72% of Hampshire's LV=CC's runs, a percentage contribution he has matched in the Natwest T20 Blast, where his 220 represent 21.61% of his team's total.

But it is Vince’s strike rate that sets him apart as a truly special talent, particularly in Championship cricket where he's scored at the rate of 81 runs per 100 balls. In the t20 Blast - where he's ranked 13th - he's upped that to 142 runs per 100 balls. His 260 runs have included consecutive fifties against Sussex, Middlesex and an Essex side who will no doubt be keen to see the back of him.

Warwickshire's overseas spinner Jeetan Patel is up to fifth overall and sixth in the LV=CC FTI MVP and provides an interesting comparison with Worcestershire's off-spinner Saeed Ajmal, who is ninth overall and 10th in the LV=CC FTI MVP.

Patel, who plays Division One cricket has scored 254 runs including 74 against Sussex and 105 v Middlesex, and taken 28 wickets from eight LV=CC matches. He's yet to take five wickets in an innings but has regularly contributed to Warwickshire victories with three four-wicket outings.

Ajmal has fewer runs (69 in total with a best of 27) but has taken 44 wickets in seven games including 6-19 versus Leicestershire this week, 7-63 in the first innings against table-topping Hampshire and his best match return of 13-94 (6-75 and 7-19) against Essex. Ajmal does, of course, lose 20% of his points as he plays Second Division cricket.

OVERALL FTI MVP