YOU can always depend on the Scottish weather to be bad and yesterday it did not disappoint.
The four-day Intercontinental Cup game between Scotland and Ireland at Mannofield ended in a damp anti-climax, with the players never taking the field.
At least the home weather turned up to save Scotland and not Ireland and it will be the home side who will be sighing with relief.
Ireland were the better team over the three days played and needed only five wickets for victory. But they will be counting the cost of one bad session on the opening day which allowed Scotland to skittle them for 203 and give the Jocks a much easier route to first-innings points.
So, more by luck than design, Scotland find themselves at the top of the cup table after claiming nine points to Ireland’s three.
Considering the relative experience of the two sides, Scotland did very well. But the Scots will be wondering how, when their number three batsman Qasim Sheikh makes a wonderful hundred, can they muster only another 108 between the other 10.
Also alarming was the misreading of the pitch. Ireland selected three spinners so confident were they that the pitch would turn. Scotland were obviously not so knowledgeable or confident, selecting only one specialist along with the admittedly more than competent Ryan Watson as back-up.
However, Ross Lyons was left twiddling his thumbs in the dressing room and the left-arm spinner must have been frustrated to see Regan West, his opposite number in the Ireland team, take eight of the 15 Scotland wickets to fall in the game.
Hindsight is a great thing but such things make a difference.
HAVE Australia also made a similar misjudgment in the fifth Ashes Test by not selecting a specialist spinner alongside the part-timers tweakers?
It remains to be seen, but with the wicket obviously very dry their only other thought must be the likelihood of getting uneven bounce or reverse swing.
The surprise is again not seeing Brett Lee in the line-up. Lee is a master of reverse swing and the standout in the non-Test matches so far on tour. At the end of day one, Australia have taken the edge with a couple of late wickets but things are set up for a fascinating few days.
SUCH is the weather that the one-day internationals at Mannofield scheduled for tomorrow and Sunday must be in doubt – as is Aberdeenshire’s penultimate league game in Edinburgh.
If the next two games are rained off then Aberdeenshire will be crowned champions – not particularly satisfying.
The same thing happened in 1996, the last time we won the league and cup double. We were due to play Grange in the last game and did not take the field due to rain. We got on our bus and headed down to Glasgow for the cup final the next day and celebrated wildly.