T20 Blast Quarter-Final Preview — Birmingham Bears v Gloucestershire
It’s time for 8 teams to try and reach the showpiece event of the County Cricket season — T20 Blast Finals Day!
Have you been working towards making sure you have quarter-finalist players in your squad from Gameweek 5, or are you just a chilled out entertainer who is reacting to whatever is thrown at you from GW to GW?
(For the Quarter-Finals, you have 4 Free Transfers, 3 Penalty Transfers and can select 5 from any one team to create your squad).
Bears v Gloucs
2024 T20 Blast Birmingham Results
Game 1: Bears 149, Notts 127/10 (19.2)
Game 2: Durham 194/9, Bears 168/10 (18.4)
Game 3: Yorkshire 145, Bears 151/6 (18.1/20)
Game 4: Bears 235/6, Northants 129/9 (18 overs)
Game 5: Worcs 187/6 (17/17) , Bears 132/10 (15.2/17)
Game 6: Bears 198/2, Derbyshire 154 (19.2)
Game 7: Bears 194/5, Leics 122 (16.4)
Birmingham
A power house top order means that when they get going, they are very hard to stop. Having Moeen Ali back strengthens any T20 team and allows even more scope for their tremendously exciting young all-rounders Bethell & Mousley to unleash with depth added to the batting. The only worry will be that if David Payne continues to take early wickets, this will expose the lower middle order that hasn’t had to do any ‘heavy lifting’ this year, although you certainly wouldn’t bet against them for being able to do so. With the ball they have the small matter of the top wicket taker in the competition this year (Danny Briggs), and are backed up with a plethora other spin options. It feels like a very strong XI with every base covered.
Predicted XI:
Ali ©, Davies, Mousley, Hain, Bethell, Benjamin (WK), Barnard, Garton, Lintott, Briggs, Gleeson
Full Bears Batting & Bowling Stats
Top Bears Pick
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So many options here, but Mousley is the man. The highest points scorer in the whole competition with just a smidgeon under 1500 points. He has played in every game and contributed in all but one of those. In fact he has contributed in a substantial way in half the games, scoring 130+ points in seven. Scoring 375 runs, at a SR of 137.36 & 13 wickets at an amazing ER of 6.86, means he is as close as you can get to a ‘guaranteed’ points scorer.
Gloucestershire
The epitome of a team being stronger than the sum of their parts. No player is over £7.5m in value, but equally no players that have contributed in the tournament are under £6m, showing how solid they are. With 7 players scoring over 500 points, they are not reliant on only one or two players to perform, a number have stood up when it matters. David Payne, in my mind, is the most under rated T20 bowler in the Blast. He is tasked with bowling at the clutch moments in every game, and rarely lets them down. 25 wickets at 6.7 is very hard to ignore. They do have a rather big hole to fill with Matt Taylor being injured, but they do have a large number of bowling options. Their biggest worry will be if their middle order can score the necessary runs against The Bears’ highly frugal spin options.
Predicted XI:
Hammond, Bancroft, Bracey (WK), B Charlesworth, J Taylor ©, O Price, Van Burren, J Shaw, D Payne, M de Lange, T Smith
Full Gloucestershire Batting & Bowling Stats
Top Gloucestershire Pick
David Payne is the absolute key player for Gloucestershire and it’s impossible to look elsewhere. In 2024 he has 25 wickets at just 6.7 bowling in the powerplay and at the death, this is quite honestly extraordinary. I had the privilege of watching him defend 5 runs in the last over against Surrey to earn Gloucestershire a tie. It was quite brilliant. He has become a master of his art and is a genuine match winner with the ball — there are not too many about.
