By Will Jackson
Assistant coach Wayne Noon admits that it's been a frustrating weekend for the Notts Outlaws, but insists it has helped them prepare themselves for a tough Royal London One-Day Cup game against Durham at the Emirates Durham ICG.
With the poor weather forcing their last two games to be abandoned, the Outlaws have been left two points adrift of first place in Group B, but are still well placed to qualify for the quarter-finals.
Following yesterday's washout against Surrey, Noon said: “It has been frustrating weekend.
“Losing two games on the bounce is never easy, I’m not sure we had that once last year.
“We’re still in a good position and we’ve had a day of making sure that the lads’ skills are up to speed ahead of the trip to Durham, especially after having two days sat down and hoping to play.
“It’s not going to be easy up at Durham, they’re getting together a little bit of form and could still qualify. That said if we beat them it’ll knock them out,” said Noon.
“There’s a lot of incentive there and we just need to make sure that when we arrive, the boys are 100% and up for the job.
“They have some experience in their batting and some dangerous players – Mark Stoneman is in form, Phil Mustard is in form and obviously there’s Paul Collingwood too, he’s a day-in-day-out performer. They should have Ben Stokes too, which will give them another boost.
“They’re dangerous, but we’re third for a reason. We’re playing good one-day cricket and we haven’t lost yet so we should go in there and put in a performance.
“Ideally we’ll win the next three, but this is our last game without (Alex) Hales and (James) Taylor. If we can get a win at Durham it’ll be a confidence boost ahead of their return for the game at Lord’s.”
Hales and Taylor are once again on England Lions duty, which means that the Outlaws have named an unchanged squad for their trip to the north-east.
On the other side of the coin, Ben Stokes has been included in the Durham squad despite being selected by England for the fifth Test against India.
England gave permission for the all-rounder to be included, despite the game taking place just three days before the final Test.
The inclusion means the Durham squad is unchanged from the side that was forced off due to bad weather last time out, but a win could catapult them into a quarter-final place.
Gloucestershire’s impressive start to the campaign has stalled a little after an abandoned game last time out left them kicking their heels as Yorkshire Vikings went above them in Group A.
However, John Bracewell’s side have lost just one game and are well-placed for a spot in the quarter-finals, needing just one win from the three remaining games – starting against Lancashire Lightning tomorrow - to seal a place.
Lancashire, deprived of influential all-rounder Tom Smith due to Lions duty, have struggled for much of the campaign, having won just one game and failed to defend a score of 300 last time out.
Chris Tremlett has returned to Surrey’s 14-man squad for their match against Warwickshire at Edgbaston tomorrow.
Jason Roy is still unavailable due to his commitments with the Lions, and Jade Dernbach, Matthew Dunn and Zafar Ansari have all been left out due to fitness problems.
Surrey remain rooted to the bottom of Group B following the abandoned encounter against Notts.
Warwickshire are still in with a shout of making the quarter-finals, despite losing their last two games, and they will have to do without England pair Ian Bell and Chris Woakes.