Rob Key, Mark Butcher, Dominic Cork, Nick Knight and James Foster select XIs from Division One, Division Two and a 'most promising' team
Saturday 29 September 2018 09:11, UK
The County Championship season came to a thrilling conclusion on Thursday as Essex beat Surrey by one wicket to prevent the newly-crowned champions going unbeaten.
As the dust settles on the 2018 campaign, we asked Rob Key, Mark Butcher, Dominic Cork, Nick Knight and James Foster to select a team of the season. By the time we were finished, though, we had three!
So here they are: the Sky Sports Cricket pundits' teams of the season for Division One, Division Two and a 'most promising' XI...
Team of the season: Rory Burns (Surrey), Keaton Jennings (Lancashire), Tom Abell (Somerset), James Hildreth (Somerset), Ollie Pope (Surrey), Ben Foakes (Surrey, wk), Rikki Clarke (Surrey), Morne Morkel (Surrey), Tom Bailey (Lancashire), Jack Leach (Somerset), Jamie Porter (Essex)
BUTCHER: Rory Burns opening, there's absolutely no question there. Then, just to get the Surrey part of it out of the way so that I'm not accused of any bias - which I will be regardless - but I'm going for Burns, Pope, Foakes, Clarke and Morkel. They did win the title by a distance, after all!
Tom Abell has had a good year, James Hildreth gets in at No 4. He's the only player other than Burns to make 1,000 runs in the summer and let's not forget that batting has not been straightforward for most of it.
Jack Leach, 11 games and 30 wickets at 24. He gets in ahead of Simon Harmer because we need a left-armer, there are no other left-armers in the team.
KEY: People might question Keaton Jennings after his struggles with England but he has played 10 Championship matches for Lancashire and has 709 runs at 47. I think he is our man at No 2.
It's amazing that Lancashire have gone down, Tom Bailey has 64 wickets at 19.66 and Graham Onions has 57 wickets at 21 so there are over 120 wickets between two bowlers at Lancashire and yet they've gone down. That's extraordinary really and I think we've got to have Bailey in there.
Let's not have an overseas but we'll have Morne Morkel as a Kolpak. Jamie Porter has to be in there, too. He's had another fantastic season with Essex.
Team of the season: Will Rhodes (Warwickshire), Joe Denly (Kent), Jonathan Trott (Warwickshire), Ian Bell (Warwickshire), Wayne Madsen (Derbyshire), Ben Brown (Sussex, wk), Matt Critchley (Derbyshire), Ollie Robinson (Sussex), Matt Henry (Kent), Olly Stone (Warwickshire), Tim Murtagh (Middlesex)
CORK: Wayne Madsen has to be in there, he's been superb for Derbyshire again. Matt Henry has been fantastic for Kent, taking more Championship wickets than anyone else in the country and, even at 37, Tim Murtagh keeps picking up wickets for Middlesex.
Olly Stone has been brilliant for Warwickshire. The one thing that he has got is pace, that's why England have picked him. He's obviously had his injury problems but he has got that pace that is different to anything else England have got at the moment.
He's quite raw, he's still learning his action but I think with that pace that he has, the heavy delivery that he can bowl, on all surfaces, some of the flat surfaces we see in international cricket, he's got the capabilities to make it at Test level.
KNIGHT: The desire that Jonathan Trott has had to finish on a high is incredible. He's obviously playing in Division Two but I think it has taken a little while, as it would also have been the case with Ian Bell, to get used to playing county cricket having come down from international cricket.
We talk about the gap going the other way but I don't think we talk enough about the mental adjustments going back, I think it's taken them a little longer than they might have thought. Those two in particular were terrific at just giving little snippets, helping people in nets and they've played a tremendous role on the pitch and a tremendous role off it too.
Team of the season: Zak Crawley (Kent), Alex Davies (Lancashire), Ben Duckett (Nottinghamshire), Ollie Pope (Surrey), Joe Clarke (Worcestershire), Ben Cox (Worcestershire, wk), Sam Curran (Surrey), Ed Barnard (Worcestershire), Tom Curran (Surrey) Josh Tongue (Worcestershire), Matt Parkinson (Lancashire)
FOSTER: We had Al Davies who I think has done exceptionally well opening the batting for Lancashire, obviously he's an excellent keeper. Unfortunately, he didn't keep a lot this year because he had a busted digit but I'm incredibly impressed with him and his grittiness.
Ben Duckett has got that X-factor about him and I think he is a seriously gifted player. Joe Clarke is a fabulous player, he scored a hundred against Essex this year, I really like the way he goes about his business. Ben Cox is a serious keeper, he's 26 so the oldest in this side but he's very good keeper. I think him and Ben Foakes are the best around outside of the England first team. For me, Foakes just shades it but Coxy is a wonderful keeper.
Matt Parkinson, the young leggie at Lancashire edges out Amar Virdi at Surrey. Yes, he bowls it on the slower side but he gets a lot on it, he gets a lot of drop so you're never really quite there. You see guys try and run at him but if you're not quite to the pitch, you'll hit it straight up and he'll get quite a few stumpings.
KEY: There are not a lot of right-handed opening batsmen but there is a lad called Zak Crawley at Kent. He's had a good year, 700-odd runs but when he got moved up to open, at the age of 20 in this tough year for batsmen, his average in those six games, purely as an opener was over 50.
At No 3 is someone I think people forget how young he is: Ben Duckett. He's not had a brilliant year but this team isn't just about that, it's about the most promising players. He's just moved to Notts, which I think is a good thing for him.
Ollie Pope has played 13 matches, 986 runs, he's missed out on playing every game and getting to that 1,000 mark due to playing for England, and he has an average of 70!
I don't think we have to say much about Sam Curran - he was England's player of the series against India. Another one people forget is still very young is Tom Curran, probably because his younger brother is now in the England side. Tom is only 23, we see him as more of an experienced player but he's still young and he gets in there.
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