by Matthew Fisher
It will be great when we are able to get the crowds back to games, and our members and supporters will definitely be missed at Emerald Headingley this weekend. The lads love the support we get.
The biggest thing I’ll miss with a home crowd when I’m fit again is actually when I come out to bat and the reception you get walking to the crease when your name is announced.
In that North East corner next to the main scoreboard, they give you a fantastic ovation, and it makes you stand a bit taller and makes you feel like it’s not just two batsmen against eleven. It turns the tables on the opposition.
I have to admit that with my bowling, I actually don’t notice the crowd too much because I’m so zoned in.
But it would be great if we can have them back before the end of the summer, for them as much as us. They are missing out on something they enjoy so much, and that’s disappointing.
I won’t be involved against Derbyshire because of a small abdominal tear I sustained in our win at Durham just over a week ago.
The recovery time for grade two tears are usually four to six weeks, but mine and Ben Coad’s (oblique) tears aren’t that serious. I think it’s more like a few weeks.
Yes, if the rehab doesn’t go well, it might be a bit longer. But hopefully it should be two or three weeks.
The next game against Lancashire is in our minds, but the physios are always a bit cautious in saying, ‘This is the date you’ll be back’. They always want to just take each day as it comes.
But we’ve both had no issues so far and have been going nicely.
We had our first bowl – not from a full pitch’s length – into a mitt on Wednesday. It was just turning our arms over really for 24 balls, and that was the first stage of back to bowling. I’m hopeful we’ll step things up by the weekend.
The Lancashire game is in mind, but we probably won’t know until a couple of days out as to whether we can get through it or not.
The four to six weeks of training and preparation we had before we played was really good, and the lads have taken the confidence from that into the games.
You can just tell the lads are enjoying playing and being competitive again. That’s what we’ve missed from the time off.
We feel like we’re thriving under the pressure of when the game gets a little bit tight, as they did in both our wins against Durham and Notts.
A great thing about this Yorkshire team is we have lads who are used to winning – Steve Patterson, Adam Lyth and Gary Ballance if he was in there.
Having Patto as captain, he knows how games go. He knows when he needs to come on and stop the flow of runs, he knows when to let other players loose to attack.
