Coetzer expects stand-ins to shine

May 7 2008 by Stuart Rayner, The Journal

DURHAM take on star-studded Lancashire on their own patch today without their captain, overseas player and their two best young fast bowlers, but Kyle Coetzer believes it could be the making of their season.

The hosts have a powerful line-up including internationals Andrew Flintoff, James Anderson, Sajid Mahmood, Mahammod Yousuf and captain Stuart Law. By contrast, Dale Benkenstein is attending the birth of his child, Neil McKenzie is also in South Africa to be best man at a wedding, Graham Onions is playing for England Lions and Liam Plunkett is missing with a side strain.

Durham have England one-day captain Paul Collingwood and Stephen Harmison available but Scottish batsman Coetzer thinks the presence of fringe players Garry Park, Ben Harmison, Mitch Claydon and Mark Davies in their 12-man squad for today’s Championship game at Old Trafford could prove crucial.

“Some of the guys are going to have to step up that little bit more,” he said. “Maybe that can kick-start our season because other players will come in, give us a little push from behind and get us going.”

Both teams go into the four-day encounter on the back of disappointing limited-overs performances. Durham played three away games in the Friends Provident Trophy over the Bank Holiday weekend, losing all three – two off the last ball. Lancashire beat Durham on Sunday but a humiliating defeat at home to Scotland followed.

The Riversiders have only one win so far in a disrupted start to the season but Coetzer, who top-scored with 61 in Monday’s comprehensive defeat to Yorkshire, was in no mood for excuses.

“I think you make your own luck,” he said. “We’re not doing a few of the basics as well as we would like so we just need to train hard, work hard and play hard. Things haven’t quite clicked yet for the team, although we’ve been involved in a couple of close games. Hopefully it will all change in the next few days.

“It’s been stop-start this season but both teams are playing in the same conditions and the better team is going to come out in the end. We just need to up our game that extra 10%.

“We’ll have to be at the top of our game against Lancashire. We all know our standards have not been as high as we would like bowling-wise and batting-wise, so we just really need to nail our basics and move from there.” Twelve months ago, Coetzer was a struggling second teamer but the fact the number three batsman has become a key player in such a short period of time represents an impressive turnaround.

The 24-year-old is modest about the improvement in his game and determined not to rest on his laurels. “I’ve had a lot of luck and I can’t really complain,” he said. “All I can try to do is keep doing the basics. I keep talking about them because that’s what we were on about in the dressing room after the game at Headingley on Monday.

“It should be a good challenge at Old Trafford. I’ll just aim to spend as much time at the crease as possible and if I’m there all day it should mean the team’s doing pretty well.”

Although Paul Collingwood is officially Durham’s vice-captain, former Australia one-day international Michael Di Venuto will lead the side this week. If seamer Claydon plays it will be only his second appearance for the county and his first in any form of cricket for Durham in just under a year.

DURHAM (from): Di Venuto (c), Stoneman, Coetzer, Collingwood, Park, Mustard (wk), B Harmison, Wiseman, Claydon, Davies, Killeen and S Harmison.