Gareth Roderick is targeting playing every first team game this season – and says Worcestershire’s tremendous team spirit will help them cope with their current injury crisis as they prepare for their final Vitality Blast fixture of the summer.
The wicket-keeper-batter has played every competitive game so far this season in the Vitality County Championship and Vitality Blast with the Metro Bank One-Day Cup next up after the National Counties warm-up game with Wales at Sudbrook on Sunday.
He sat down with Worcestershire Head Coach Alan Richardson at the end of last season to map out the possibility of being an ever present this summer.
Roderick has stayed fit whilst up to eight players have been sidelined around him, primarily from the bowling department, ahead of the Rapids remaining Blast game versus Derbyshire Falcons on Thursday at Visit Worcestershire New Road (5.30pm start).
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But he says Worcestershire’s strong mentality in the dressing room comes to the fore.
He said: “It is important everyone binds together to get through this injury crisis. That is one of the things we have always done.
“The kind of mentality is ‘next man up’ which you need to have because you don’t really have another option.
“We’ve always had a good team spirt and a kind of team unity in the dressing room so not too much changes.
“We are missing a lot of players and you’ve just got to kind of back the next guy to come in and do a job for us.
“What makes it tougher is that’s they are nearly all bowlers. That’s the part that makes it really challenging.
“It is all one side of the ball whereas, if it is spread across the squad, you’ve at least got a couple of guys batting and bowling still.
“But being all bowlers it is quite tough when you have a small squad like ourselves already trying to compete across three formats.”
Roderick added: “When you see players going off in the middle of a game (Matthew Waite and Hayden Walsh), you start to think things aren’t going your way and the forces are working against you for the season but that’s not the right way to think.
“These things happen. It’s just unfortunate it’s happened to us all at the same time. Hopefully they are varying degrees of injuries so hopefully some of those guys will be back soon.
“It is very unique circumstance. I’ve never known it to be this bad.”
Roderick did not play any T20 matches last summer but, all things being equal, Thursday will be his 14th successive appearance in 2024 to make him an ever present after also appearing in all nine Championship games.
He said: “I’ve thoroughly enjoyed playing it and I set out a goal at the start of the year to play every single first team game.
“Touchwood, barring injury and a drop off in form and if selected, I’ll be available for all of them.
“Hopefully at the end of the season I can look back and say I’ve played every game of the year which I’ll be immensely proud of.
“I sat down with Alan and the coaching staff at the back end of last year and put a goal in place for me to try and play every first team game this summer.
“Hopefully that can continue and at the end of summer I can look back on an injury free campaign and one where I’ve played a lot of cricket.”
He added: “I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the T20 and also batting in different positions. It’s also been quite fun trying to bat in different scenarios, trying to do different things.
“Obviously, I haven’t played a lot of T20 cricket over the last few years so it has been a bit of a learning curve, and learning about myself, and how to go about things again in T20.
“I’ve done some okay things and disappointed myself in other spheres, but I thoroughly enjoy playing it, how quick it is and the crowds and atmospheres are a bit bigger and louder.”
Thursday’s match is sponsored by NANT – Water Safety Specialists.
Worcestershire Rapids
2 Jake Libby
3 Josh Cobb
7 Ed Pollock
9 Gareth Roderick (w)
11 Rehaan Edavalath
12 Tom Taylor
13 Henry Cullen
14 Olly Cox
15 Brett D’Oliveira (c)
41 Harry Darley
77 Ethan Brookes
88 Rob Jones
