Gloucestershire give McCullum losing debut

Gloucestershire 163 for 6 (Dent 45, Cockbain 40) beat Middlesex 159 for 9 (Stirling 60, Voges 52*) by four wickets Scorecard

When Colin Graves drew opprobrium in the shires for describing the T20 Blast as ‘mediocre’, this is surely the T20 Blast he had in mind.

In some ways, Graves was just oh so depressingly right. As hard as Middlesex toiled to make this fixture work, the weather was so cold that umpire Neil Mallender wore gloves, the light so terrible that it seemed a miracle that the game was completed and, consequently, a crowd of a tick over 2,100 – in the circumstances, a success – showed up.

As with this competition as a whole, just too much was left to the chance of a sunny evening to be an adequate spectator experience. And, given not a soul was able to watch on TV (the broadcasters’ sole contribution was sending a single camera), the spectator experience is all that matters. When a sluggish pitch and a Neil Shipperley-paced outfield were thrown in, as pretty and quaint as all this was, it did not really feel like T20 cricket at all; one senses that this is not quite what Stuart Robertson had in mind when he founded the format 13 years ago. The Big Bash was not looking north green-eyed.

Such are the perils of a 135-game season. Yet take a look at the talent on display, particularly in Middlesex’s top order but also in Gloucestershire’s workmanlike side, and it is clear how much the Blast had going for it. Brendon McCullum, making his debut for …

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