After another long winter of indoor training, fitness testing and weather watching, spring has finally sprung, meaning only one thing – cricket is back!
With the start of Worcestershire’s 2026 season imminent, and the players having assembled at Kidderminster this week for their first taste of outdoor training, Men’s Head Coach Alan Richardson gave us all the latest while his squad continue to prepare to start a packed pre-season schedule.
With ground maintenance at New Road in full-swing, the players have this week been through their paces on a high-intensity programme at Kidderminster CC, which has allowed the squad to work on all facets of the game in an outdoor environment as their first pre-season assignment hones into view.
Richardson, said the squad have adjusted in an excellent manner, with the coach loving the palpable buzz that has coincided with Worcestershire’s return to grass.
“It’s been great to have everyone back. We all departed at the end of September, and since then some guys have been with us throughout, but some have been having their own little journeys and explorations away from home.
“So, to get them all back has been a really nice feeling. Everyone gives their own kind of energy to the group, for example, today was the first time that guys would have seen Gareth Roderick for five months!
“Similarly with Ben Gibbon, who’d been away for three or four months in Adelaide as well, joined us. Whenever we get additions like that, it really adds to the group. They’ve got plenty of stories to share with us as well, which only helps that cohesive feeling.”
With one of the wettest starts to a calendar year in recent memory elongating the squad’s indoor training schedule, the combination of blue skies and warmer weather created a tangible excitement that surged around the group when the Pears began outdoor training for the first time earlier this week.
17 members of the senior squad trained together, with the bowling and batting groups acquiring some vital time in the nets, facing off against one another whilst adjusting to the challenges and nuances of outdoor cricket in the early spring.
Training, led by Richardson’s coaching team of Kadeer Ali, Richard Jones and Alexei Kervezee, consisted of extended net sessions, wider team fielding drills and regular team meetings.
Richardson explained that the focus of the week’s training block at Kidderminster was to bolster the workload of his squad, who trained every day in the lead up to this weekend’s pre-season opener.
“We have talked a lot about trying to get some really good volume in.
“With the bowlers, for quite a few of them its first chance to bowl out on grass, which is a big thing for us. They’ve done really well and got through three good days of that and then for the batters, it’s a completely different challenge for them from playing indoors at Malvern.
“The ball’s nipped around a little bit which has been nice. It comes off slightly differently and at different paces, so for them to get back into the groove is great. They’ve hit plenty of balls, so overall it’s been really good.
“Of course, just that fielding element as well, where there is an element of getting out and getting it done. Monday was considerably colder than it has been the last two days, and whilst catching balls in the cold is not something that’s always high on the list of priorities for the lads, they need to do it, and they’ve done it really well.”
Not to be thrown off course by the enforced cancellation of the scheduled pre-season tour to Oman, the coaching group acted swiftly to secure alternative arrangements that will ensure the squad are still aptly prepared for the first Rothesay County Championship Division Two fixture of the summer, when the Pears travel to Derbyshire at the start of April.
In a packed calendar, a 13-man squad will travel to Hove to face Sussex in a two-day friendly this Sunday, before hot-footing it back to Kidderminster where the side will begin another two-day fixture, this time against Glamorgan on the 24th and 25th of this month, finishing pre-season preparations with an enticing three-day match against Warwickshire at Edgbaston on Saturday next week.
The Men’s Head Coach emphasised the importance of a rotational selection policy that will see the entire squad feature across the two and three-day matches.
“In effect, we’re playing a four-day game spread over two different venues, with all the squad, or as much of the squad involved in all four days as possible.
“We’ll get through that, then after a couple of days off from Cricket we play Warwickshire at Edgbaston on the Saturday, Sunday and Monday, which, again, will be pretty much a whole squad involvement and we will try and give as many people opportunities as we can.
“And we’ll probably just narrow that focus the closer we get to the Derbyshire game, we’ll see how it lands. We are very much in the lap of the gods with the weather, we’ve been very lucky in the last couple of days that it’s been beautiful and sunny, but we know that could easily change for us.
“So, we’ll take the opportunity as best we can but we’ll certainly get as many guys out there playing competitive cricket as possible and just make sure that we’re all really aligned with what we’re trying to achieve and how we’re going to try and achieve that.”
Aside from new signing Beyers Swanepoel, who’s arrival is imminent, young wicket-keeper batter Henry Cullen was the only absentee from training this week after his delayed arrival back from a successful winter stint playing in Australia.
Ahead of the crucial block of fixtures starting on Sunday, much of the Worcestershire squad are fit and available for selection, all apart from three players, who will be absent from Sunday’s opening match at Hove.
Bowler Ben Allison and batter Dan Lategan have been ruled out due to some minor injury concerns, whilst Richardson explained the reasoning behind the planned absence of opening batter, Rehaan Edavalth.
“Rehaan will be with Loughborough University this week. They’ve got fixtures against Notts and Gloucestershire and I think it’s really important for him to play there.
“He’s a huge part of the programme there and it’s a real good opportunity for him to play against some really good opposition.
“Ben Allison’s got a little bit of a back niggle at the moment, so we just need to manage that, meaning he’ll probably miss a little bit of time for us.
“Dan Lategan is just subject to some ongoing investigations into some shoulder stuff with him, we just need to be careful with that. Certainly, for Dan, it’ll be modified a little bit to start off with, but he should still be part of those pre-season games in some form.”
