Picture by John Heald. Nottinghamshire coach Peter Moores leads the applause as Jonny Bairstow heads back to the dressing room having carried Yorkshire to victory.
Jonny Bairstow celebrated his 37th birthday in style with a superb 38 not out to steer Yorkshire to a season-ending one-wicket victory over Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge this evening.
Yorkshire were 54-0 chasing 159 but slipped to 153-9, leaving Bairstow and Jack White at the crease hoping to get the White Rose over the line for a third straight Rothesay County Championship win.
Bairstow hit three sixes, including one over cover off Mohammad Ali to win it.
It wasn’t a sizeable innings such as a hundred, but it was mightily impressive from the Yorkshire captain, who then spoke to the media, revealed his love for playing at Trent Bridge and opened up on his desire to lead his county to the Championship title next summer.
“I just love this place,” he said of the ground where he scored his maiden first-class hundred in 2010. “I absolutely love Trent Bridge.
“Look, we’ve owed it to ourselves this year. We’ve been below par with the bat, and that’s every single one.
“There’s been too many times George and Bessy have bailed us out throughout the year.
“But, to finish the year on a high like that, with the other results throughout the year that we’ve had, I think it should stand us in good stead for next year.
“You look at who we’ve lost to, Hampshire and Leicestershire, and who we’ve beaten in Somerset twice, Surrey and these (Notts’).
“There’s a couple of games when we could have got over the line, Surrey away, Warwickshire at home. But that’s the ruthless edge that we need.”
The celebrations from the Yorkshire dressing room were noticeably vociferous after Bairstow hit his match-winning six to end a day which started with Jack White and Ben Coad routing Nottinghamshire for 85 in their second innings with nine wickets between them. White took 5-23, his best figures in Yorkshire colours.
Bairstow said: “Any time you play against Notts’ – they won the Championship last year, and you want to put yourself against the best teams and front up against the best teams.
“The teams that we haven’t fronted up against are actually the teams that have gone down, which is such a shame, really. So, yeah, it does mean a lot, and it means a lot to me. You can see that.
“I needed to just do that for the lads.
“After coming back from The Hundred, that was a bit tricky, and there was a few bits with that which I think from a technical point of view set me back a little bit.
“And that’s cricket. You work through different bits, and you’ve got to keep working through them. It’s a game which challenges you whether you’ve played it for one year or however many.”
On today, Bairstow continued: “We nearly stuffed that up, needing 88 with nine wickets left.
“That, this morning from Jack and Coady, was outstanding.
“Look, the lads have been good throughout the year.
“There’s just been periods where we’ve just not quite got it exactly right.
“They’ve been very good at keeping it tight. However, the cutting-edge bit is the bit that we need to just have, if you like. And we’ll be better next year for that. I have no doubt about that.
“I love the introduction of Ben Cliff coming in at the back end of the year to get an 11-for and then four in the first innings here.
“Look at Whitey, he’s trucked in all year and he hasn’t got his rewards at times and then he rocks in this morning and does that.”
And on the prospect of progressing again and winning the title as skipper, he added: That’s why I wanted to do it (captaincy), because I genuinely believe that with the group that we’ve got, we have an opportunity to do that.
“And that’s why it’s been frustrating at times this year, because we haven’t fulfilled that potential and the lads haven’t been consistent enough for long enough.
“That’s something that as much as you try and drill, it’s something that at some point they’ve got to take ownership of.
“If they want to go on to further honours, it’s up to them.
“That’s why I’m still playing, still keeping, doing all that stuff, because ultimately I want to win the County Championship.
“I felt like we had a squad to do that. This year, we’ve just fallen short. But, like I alluded to, there’s been games where all of a sudden, the guys are like, ‘Hello, we can do it’.”
