“Curse, what curse?” says Anthony McGrath as Yorkshire CCC looks to break Chesterfield jinx
ANTHONY MCGRATH, the Yorkshire head coach, is refusing to be spooked by “the curse of Chesterfield”.
Yorkshire have lost their last eight T20s at the ground in a horror run dating from 2015.
Prior to that, McGrath was involved as a player when Yorkshire won their first two T20s at the Queen’s Park venue, to where they return on Sunday afternoon (2.30 start).
He top-scored with an undefeated 72 in an 11-run win in 2008 and chipped in during an eight-wicket triumph the following year, Yorkshire going on to make it four T20 triumphs in succession at Chesterfield on their only other “pre-curse” visits in 2013 and 2014.
“Well, I've got good memories of Chesterfield, apart from last season, so I don't see what all the fuss is about it, but we'll see,” laughed McGrath, whose side lost there by seven wickets in his first summer as Yorkshire head coach.
“In my playing days we won there quite a bit, and in the Championship as well, so I used to enjoy going to Chesterfield.
“We probably should have won there last year; we got 200, which we thought was above par, and then I think they got 90 in the first six overs, which blew us out of the water.
“I don’t have a theory as to why the club has struggled there recently, but I do know that if we play how we can play, the grounds are irrelevant.”
Yorkshire still remain fractionally in credit when it comes to T20 away games in Derbyshire, winning nine and losing those eight on the spin at Queen’s Park.
They won eight of the first nine meetings between 2004 and 2014, including four at Derby, the other fixture being a no-result.
Yorkshire last beat Derbyshire away in T20 at Derby in 2016, Kane Williamson top-scoring with 65 and Adil Rashid taking 3-20.
“I don’t think we’ve been losing at Chesterfield in recent times because of the ground,” added McGrath.
“I think we’ve been losing there because we haven't been good enough and we've probably not had the right players in the right places, and components, and different sorts of things.
“If you don’t play well enough across the 40 overs, more often than not it doesn’t matter who you’re playing or where you’re playing.
“Hopefully, we can start to change the narrative of the stats at Chesterfield and get a win there on Sunday.”