Come into the over strong, get out of the over strong - Masood's call to Yorkshire's bowlers

The Yorkshire captain takes his side to face Worcestershire at New Road on Friday in the T20 Blast wanting more control from his bowling unit.

Masood has pinpointed it as the key area following Yorkshire’s defeat in their T20 opener at Birmingham Bears.

“There’s one thing in T20 cricket that I always look for as a captain, and that’s your first ball and your last ball,” he said.

“Those are the most important deliveries of an over.

“You come into the over strong, you get out of the over strong, and if we see the scorecard (against Birmingham) I think there are a lot of first ball and especially last ball boundaries.

“Those are the little things we can improve.”

Masood’s recall was spot-on, with a glance at the over-by-over breakdown of the match showing that Yorkshire were less than tight in that regard as Birmingham scored 200-6 from their 20 overs.

In the first half of the innings Yorkshire were impressive; apart from a four off the final ball of the first over from Dominic Leech, followed by a four and a six off the first and last balls of his next over (the third), Yorkshire did not concede a first or last ball boundary in the opening 10 overs as they restricted Bears to 70-4.

However, in a wayward second half of the innings, in which they conceded 13 runs an over collectively, Yorkshire were guilty of twice as many of the transgressions that Masood is keen for them to eliminate.

Leech conceded a six off the first ball of the 11th over; Ben Mike a four from the final ball of the 13th; Matty Revis a four off the first ball and a six off the last ball of the 18th over; Jordan Thompson a four off the final ball of the 19th, and Mike a four off the last ball of the 20th.

“We won the toss, put them in and initially did what we wanted to do,” Masood added.

“We had them 51-4 at one point and that’s when you want to really kill the game.

“Where you give them (Birmingham) credit is they still kept attacking, but I think that if a side is 51-4, with our quality, we shouldn’t be conceding 200 runs.

“That’s something we need to look at and put right next time.”

Yorkshire’s quest for more control will be boosted by the arrival of David Wiese, the Namibia international, who is set to debut as an overseas player, with pace bowler Matty Fisher also available.

Jonny Tattersall is set to make his first appearance of the season after a finger injury, replacing Jonny Bairstow behind the stumps, with the latter preparing for the first Test against Ireland on Thursday.

As well as wanting greater consistency from his bowlers, with Yorkshire light on experience in that first match at Edgbaston, Masood believes there is room for improvement with the bat.

Yorkshire slumped to 66-7 before Dom Bess (42 not out) and Jafer Chohan (37) averted what would have been a humiliating defeat with a ninth-wicket stand of 62, a club record in T20, to lift their team to a final total of 166 all-out.

“We need to analyse the conditions better,” reflected Masood.

“I know that everything’s easier in hindsight, and when you’re chasing 200, everything’s going at the speed of light.

“But that’s when we should have realised that maybe keeping our best batsmen in for the back end of the innings would have been better.

“As Bessy showed, as Mala (opener Dawid Malan, who top-scored with 43) showed, as Jafer showed, it was much easier batting when the ball got a little bit softer.”

Masood did not exempt himself from the charge, the left-hander chopping on for five when he tried to hit England’s Chris Woakes over the top.

It left Yorkshire 15-3 to the final delivery of the third over, following the loss of Adam Lyth and Bairstow, when a period of consolidation might have been preferable.

“In my dismissal I got an inside edge, but my intention was to hit ‘Woakesy’ over his head and maybe if we’d slowed the clock down a little bit, batted a few overs, assessed the conditions and then taken charge it would have been better,” said Masood. “Assessing conditions is something we have to get right.”

Not that there is any need for panic stations after just one game.

One of the advantages, in this instance, of the T20 Blast is that each county plays 14 group matches.

“What matters is the momentum you carry at the back end of the tournament,” said Masood.

“When I was at Derby last year, we had four losses from the first six and we ended up winning nine games after the 14, so there’s a long way to go.”

Yorkshire (from): Lyth, Malan, Masood (captain), Fraine, Tattersall, Wiese, Revis, Thompson, Bess, Fisher, Chohan, Hill, Leech, Mike.