REPORT & QUOTES | Derbyshire wrap up innings victory on final day of the season

Derbyshire have routed Kent by an innings and 229 runs in their final Rothesay County Championship match of the season at Canterbury.

Luis Reece, who’d scored 211 in Derbyshire’s only innings, took five for 63, while Ben Aitchison and Zak Chappell both took two wickets apiece as the visitors sealed third place in Division Two.

Ben Compton was Kent’s top scorer with 65 but the home side already knew they’d finish bottom, regardless of the outcome.

Kent began day four on 135 for five in their second innings, 291 behind, and their tissue-paper thin hopes of avoiding defeat faded when they lost Harry Finch in the fourth over of the morning, lbw to Aitchison for 14.

Aitchison, whose sister Holly is in the England squad for today’s Rugby World Cup final with Canada, then got the key wicket of Compton, again lbw and although Corey Flintoff hung around for 35 balls, he eventually pulled Chappell straight to Aneurin Donald at square leg and was caught for 11.

Grant Stewart gave a sparse crowd some entertainment, hooking Chappell for six, but the bowler than had Matt Parkinson caught by Donald at short leg for a six-ball duck.

The visitors concluded a win that had looked inevitable for the best part of three days when Michael Cohen flashed at Reece and was caught by a diving Brooke Guest, also without scoring.

The wicket meant Reece became only the 51st person, world-wide, to score a double-century and take five wickets in a first-class match.

Derbyshire’s Mickey Arthur said: “I thought we were superb in our disciplines. The mindset shift for us has been astronomical in terms of wanting to win and winning games and setting up games to win, playing a lot more of a brand of more positive cricket which as a captain and coach we’ve driven, and the boys have responded unbelievably well to that.

“So I couldn’t be more proud in that performance because that sort of sums us up as a team and shows where we can get to. Team-wise, I thought the fielding was outstanding. It’s a strange thing to pick on, but the fielding was outstanding on the back of that huge first innings total.

“When you have a look at the way the guys go about their business out on the ground and the fielding and the intensity and the energy, it tells you where we’re at as a team and I couldn’t be more proud of that because it shows that guys have really bought into it. You chase every ball down, you attempt every catch and I think we showed that in this game in heaps.”

(On Luis Reece)

“It’s almost ridiculous. It’s been a phenomenal season for Luis and he’s mostly done that on one leg as well. He goes in for an operation in the next couple of days to clear out his ankle.

It’s a phenomenal, phenomenal performance and it just shows again the determination, the drive of him and everybody within our squad to get better. Training has been an absolute pleasure. Lewis has epitomised that by guys coming down to train with one purpose and one purpose only in mind and that’s to get better.

“Wayne Madsen led the team unbelievably well through this year as well. I’ve been very proud of the way he’s led but you can never fault him for that. He keeps churning (performances) out in all forms and he’s still fit, he still catches well in the slips.

(On Jack Morley)

“He’s got a high ceiling, a very, very high ceiling. His best ball is as good as I’ve ever seen.

His best ball is as good as any left off spinner I’ve seen, including the boys I’ve seen in the sub-continent. What we need from him is consistency. He’s a tinkerman, he tinkers with his action all the time.

“I need him to stop doing that and just be consistent because when you’re consistent you get rid of people. So when he’s in the heat of battle and it just doesn’t feel well, he’s got some reference points to go back to which I didn’t think he had midway through the season. So we’ve worked really hard with him.”

“We’ve got (Matt) Montgomery and we’ll have a very good overseas fast bowler joining us. That strengthens us again and we’re going to be a very, very good side. We keep the mindset of trying to get out there and win every game and who knows where we could end up.

(Any regrets?)

“I look at two results in particular. We ended up six points behind Glamorgan and we needed 66 of 60 balls in that fourth innings run chase at Cardiff, that was a 16-point swing in the season for us. Then we had the same at Bristol where we had the game won in the fourth innings chase and just didn’t manage to get over the line so we ended up drawing both those games. Those are the two disappointments because if we had got over the line in one of them, we’d be about talking about Division One next year.

“But you can take those experiences and these players can take those experiences presumably and think we’re not doing that again. It’s part of your growth as a team.

I might add that there were a couple of games where I think in Lancashire at Old Trafford where we were battling it out to save the game and ended up saving it.”