Sunday, September 24th, 2023

CULLEN EARNS PRAISE AFTER STEPPING INTO KEEPER ROLE

Head Coach Alan Richardson praised the performance of substitute Worcestershire keeper, Henry Cullen, on the final day of the LV=Insurance County Championship encounter with Durham at New Road.

Cullen made his senior debut in last summer’s One Day Cup but this represented his first opportunity behind the stumps in the four-day format for the senior side.

He replaced Gareth Roderick who had suffered a finger injury earlier in the game and was not risked as a precaution.   

Richardson said: “Henry has had a couple of opportunities in the One Day Cup and has always kept really well.

“A really good sign is you don’t notice your keeper at times and I thought Henry was incredibly tidy.

“He had lots of energy behind the stumps. A real learning curve for him and it sounded like he really enjoyed it.”

Worcestershire’s slip cordon was disrupted by the broken wrist suffered by batter Adam Hose when batting on the third day and a couple of chances went to ground.

Richardson said: “One thing we’d like to have in that slip cordon is a bit of continuity and we didn’t have that in this game with Adam missing out.

“That got disrupted a little bit but when we go into the next game, we will try and create those chances, and I’m sure those boys will be snaffling those catches.”