Jonathan Trott says Warwickshire will face Somerset in the Royal London Cup semi-final at Edgbaston full of confidence after they continued their advance with a handsome 70-run quarter-final win over Essex.
The Bears booked a home semi with an excellent all-round display of the sort they had produced against Yorkshire at Headingley in the last group game to ensure their place in the last eight.
They are now one win from a Lord’s final, thanks not least to Trott whose century against Essex was his second in successive Royal London Cup games. He averages 77.60 in the competition this season, having hit three centuries and a half-century in six innings.
Now he is looking forward to the mouth-watering bank holiday weekend home semi with Somerset – but also in the meantime wants to see the Bears’ excellent 50-over form translated into their Specsavers County Championship cricket in Durham next week.
“We have ended up with a home semi-final which is very nice to have in prospect,” Trott said. “We play good cricket here at Edgbaston and Somerset are going to have to play really well to beat us.
“It was important that we put in a good performance against Essex.
Hopefully we can now put in another big one in the four-day game coming up at Durham and the win will give us a little bit of momentum after two disappointing four-day losses.
“Our 50-over cricket is very strong this season. We treated the game at Yorkshire as a knockout game and played well there and ended up winning pretty comfortably to earn a quarter-final and then did another good job on Essex.
“The semi will be a great occasion. There was a good crowd in on a weekday for the quarter-final and now it’s great to have a home semi-final to look forward. The support we get at Edgbaston is always appreciated.”
Pivotal to the win over Essex was Trott’s partnership of 136 with Tim Ambrose. It was a game-changing stand which blossomed after a watchful start (three successive maidens) and Trott revealed that Ambrose’s nous was a vital ingredient.
“Batting first, it is always a question of reading the wicket well so that you know what is a defendable total,” he said. “It was great to be batting with Tim because it’s always good having a wicketkeeper there because they have very good eyes on wickets with regard to whether it is going to deteriorate or not.
“Tim said it probably would deteriorate and slow up so we didn’t need to take too many risks but just get ourselves a good base, then launch from their in the last ten overs. He was spot on.”
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