Allenby keen for North's arrival

By Richard Thomas

There is no doubt struggling Glamorgan, having lost their opening three County Championship games, cannot wait for the arrival of overseas star Marcus North.

It has been the worst start to a Championship season the Welsh county have experienced since the 2005 season when, in their only foray into Division One, they lost the first five matches.

Very poor batting has been at the heart of Glamorgan’s early season travails, but there is hope that North, who arrives from Australia next week after paternity leave, can help to turn round the dismal start which has seen his temporary replacement Moises Henriques, the Australian all-rounder, score only 36 runs in six innings.

Jim Allenby, for one, is sure North can be the catalyst to a Glamorgan team which had expected to have both the Australian and South African Alviro Petersen in the side from the start of this season.

Petersen had been due to return to Cardiff as a Kolpak but then decided to carry on with his South Africa career and has since joined Essex for the first part of the season.

“The side will get stronger with Marcus coming into the top order,” said Allenby. “Going from having two international players in the top four to none makes a big difference to most sides, but especially ours. We have got talented young players but not many experienced guys, so you are always playing catch-up.

“We have not had that international quality player and as soon as Marcus comes, I am sure you will see a big difference. He is a fine player and a good person, so he is going to add quality to the side and the changing room. He will add more than runs and you will see the difference in the other batters as well as they learn about his preparations.”


Date: 27/04/2012 12:58:36 by Richard Thomas
In: Today | Glamorgan |