Gooch urges England top order to cash in

Batting coach Graham Gooch urged England’s top order to make the most of sound starts after all the side’s specialist batsmen failed to do just that on the first day of their Ashes warm-up against Essex.
England finished the opening day of four at Chelmsford on Sunday well-placed at 328 for seven but with the only stand of note thus far coming from an unbroken eighth-wicket century partnership between Tim Bresnan (55 not out) and Graeme Swann (62 not out).

Former Essex and England captain Gooch, one of England’s greatest batsmen, has long emphasised the importance of ‘daddy hundreds’ -- players turning good starts into truly large scores.
All of England’s top seven, including captain Alastair Cook, Gooch’s protege, reached double figures Sunday but none could follow the master’s example.

But they should have at least one more chance to spend some time in the middle before England begin the defence of the Ashes with the first Test against Australia in Nottingham starting on July 10.  ‘It’s a fair total. But we’d have liked some of our top order to spend more time at the crease, and capitalise on their starts,’ Gooch said. 

‘You want your main batsmen to get into a bit of rhythm, get their games in order so that we’re building up to peak next week,’ he explained.  ‘You’ve got to bat long. Once you get in, you’ve got to capitalise on that. Certainly, if we get starts we’ve got to put big totals.’