1sts have last warm-up match and Selection starts for the Midland League

Andy Kearns - Tuesday, 18 May, 2004

As you can see from the Team Sheet, we lost our annual match against Smoerset. However it was a very good work-out and highlighted the importance of short game and putting in general

The Somerset team are already 2 months into their league campaign, and have thus been playing very competitive golf since March. They've had the opportunity to putt on good quality greens for a couple of months already and have honed their stroke accordingly - courses on the South West coast tend to get their greens to competitive standard a bit earlier than we do in the Midlands.

This showed as the Somerset guys putted slightly better on the day, even though tee to green the Warwickshire boys were equally as good if not better. It was a useful lesson to learn, and we will make some changes to our early season focus for next year (i.e. get working on good greens earlier).

Whilst it's never nice to lose, this match will be used as a bit of a wake up call to the squad, and will only help to firm up our resolve for the first match against Shropshire and Herefordshire at Kenilworth on June 6th (remember last year Shropshire & Herefordshire gave us a bit of a golf lesson !!).

I'd like to finish this my first editorial for the web site with a few words about selection.

I am very fortunate this year in that I reckon there are about 22 people who could all perform at first team level and who may well be asked to do so at some time during the year. The friendlies have worked well in that most of these 22 have been involved in at least one match, and have got a feel for the way we want to do things in Team Warwickshire.

That being said, I need to remember Team Warwickshire's goals - including winning the Midland League 1st & 2nd team titles and qualification for the County Finals.

For this to happen, we need the maximum flexibility from all players and officials as I am going to have to make judgements regarding whom I think can do the best job on any given day.

To make this judgement I will be take into account technical ability and form, personal attitude, team working skills and other things that may give us an edge - like playing home players around home courses. I will be trying to make these decisions as scientifically as possible, but there will always inevitably be a judgement call, and I will have to make a difficult decision.

This means that at times players who think they should be picked for a particular match won't be. I appreciate that being left out is not a pleasant experience (I had to win the Trials twice before I was regularly picked for the 1st team !!), but it will have to happen due to the depth of quality we have in Warwickshire.

If it does happen to players, all I can say is that it will be a decision I have to make based on what I think is right (as 1sts team Captain), and that a player's response to that decision will tell me a lot about that individual.

If it was me who was excluded, I would be doing my utmost to prove that the captain was wrong by winning for the 2nd team and performing well in local and national events. Also remember that there are 5 league matches through the season, and I definitely won't be able to always pick the same 10.

I'm not going to be doing a Claudio Ranieri, but we will need players to move in and out of 1st and 2nd teams for various matches because not everybody will be able to play in every match. This is where commitment to Team Warwickshire could set us apart from the other counties.

Given what we have done over the last few months, and the depth of talent, I believe that we are very well set to achieve our goals, and I am really looking forward to getting stuck in against Shropshire & Herefordshire on June 6th.

This season WILL be a successful season, if everybody pulls together, and the Team Warwickshire effect is maximised. I am convinced that we will see new stars shining through this year and next year, and have already seen some amazing golf from the likes of Ben Stafford and Andy Sullivan who are both still in the junior set up.

As our performance coach says ..... "IF WE DO THE RIGHT THINGS, SUCCESS IS PREDICTABLE !!!" ... It's in our hands !!

WARWICKSHIRE 1ST TEAM vs SOMERSET

DATE : 02/05/2004

WARKS Points/Score SOMERSET Points/Score

Paul Randle & Chris Evans 1 2UP R Carter & S Hughes

Carl Kirby & Gareth Jenkins R Jones & A Meads 1 2&1

Bill Nicolson & Carl Kirby J Lane & G Morgan 1 3&2

Ben Stafford & Tom Webber 0.5 P White & R French 0.5

Ian Stranks & Adam Gray 1 4&3 R Maunder & J Atkins

Score after foursomes 2.5 2.5

Paul Randle J Lane 1 1 UP

Chris Evans 0.5 R Carter 0.5