Alec Stewart determined to correct Surrey fortunes after poor collective season

Stewart has also promised a clear uplift in fortunes in 2020 as the county champions of 2018 begin a winter of introspection and hard work to prepare for next season

Alec Stewart has identified a collective failure to put together consistent performances, rather than any startling individual fall-offs in form, as the main reason for Surrey’s poor summer in 2019.

Stewart has also promised a clear uplift in fortunes in 2020 as the county champions of 2018 begin a winter of introspection and hard work to prepare for next season.

Surrey’s director of cricket, moreover, in withdrawing this week from the race to become the next England head coach, in succession to Trevor Bayliss, has actually started that process himself.

Uncertainty about Stewart’s future would have worried many at Surrey, who recognise just how much the former England captain has done for the club in recent years, but that concern has now gone.

Stewart’s lifelong dedication to Surrey, his steely-eyed overseeing of the transformation from Division Two team five years ago to champions last year, and his unwavering belief in the need for continually developing homegrown talent, have all been central planks in the club’s recent successes.

This past season, as Stewart acknowledges, represents a significant setback. Sixth place in the Specsavers County Championship, with just two wins from the 14 fixtures, followed elimination at the group stages of both white-ball competitions, and Surrey must now regroup in a bid to improve all facets of their game.

Michael Di Venuto, Surrey’s head coach, spoke frequently in the closing weeks of the summer about the frustration of seeing his players perform only to their abilities in fits and starts.

Confidence, as both Di Venuto and Stewart admitted, had been gradually eroded through long weeks bedevilled by a seemingly never-ending injury list, too many below-par displays with the bat in particular, and the regular unavailability of England and England Lions players.

The regular absences on national duty of Rory Burns, the club captain, Jason Roy, Tom and Sam Curran, however, were a considerable source of pride for everyone at Surrey – and, along with the likes of Ollie Pope and Ben Foakes, represents the club’s greatest glory of the past few years.

Finding, developing and preparing young players to go to play for England is, insists Stewart, the prime reason for any county club to exist.

^{Ollie Pope's late-season form was a high point in a difficult season}

As for 2019, the brightest note was the late summer form of Pope, who returned from a three-month lay-off following shoulder surgery to score 561 runs in eight championship innings and win selection on England’s winter Test tour of New Zealand.

Rikki Clarke’s evergreen form with bat and ball brought him 662 runs and 43 wickets in four-day cricket, while fellow all-rounder Jordan Clark made progress in his first season after joining from Lancashire last winter.

Perhaps the most significant individual performance of the season, though, came from Amar Virdi against Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge in mid-July – in his first appearance of the summer.

After criticism of his fitness levels, with Stewart going public to say the highly-promising Virdi had to improve if he was to fulfil his potential, the Chiswick-born off spinner grabbed match figures of 14 for 139 on a pitch prepared to suit Notts’ Indian Test star Ravi Ashwin – out-bowling his celebrated opponent and leading Surrey to the victory that all but confirmed their Division One status.

In the week before his 21st birthday, it really did seem as if Virdi – and ever-present during Surrey’s title triumph in 2018 – had come of age with the best match analysis by a Surrey bowler since Martin Bicknell in 2000.

Virdi went on to play in Surrey’s last five Championship games, finishing with 23 wickets at an average of 19.65 and – like all his teammates – very much looking forward to next year.

Courtesy of the ECB Reporters Network.