Leicestershire are the ‘heroin addicts’ who have kicked the losing habit

Meanwhile, Leicestershire – a cash-poor club who look on with envy at Lancashire’s high-earning hotel, conferencing and events strands – are so far clear at the top of the second division that missing out on promotion is fast becoming unthinkable. That fellow minnows Derbyshire sit immediately beneath them underlines the surprise nature of this unexpected red-ball spring.

“We’ve worked extremely hard over the past couple of years and you’re starting to see the fruits of everyone’s labour,” Sean Jarvis, Leicestershire chief executive, told The Observer. “One of the beauties of this sport is that anybody can beat anybody. We’ve always said that we’re a challenger brand and that’s what we’ve rediscovered in recent years.

“What we’ve done is ensured the people that we believe in, we’ve backed and supported. What’s exciting is we believe there’s more to come from them.”

Shorn of the cash reserves and stadium allure that enable big-name signings, the Division Two leaders have forged their own path under new captain Peter Handscomb, exploiting the loan market to great effect and deploying their resources in unusual manners. Nowhere has that been more evident than in England leg-spinner Rehan Ahmed’s reinvention as a top-three batter, with two centuries to his name already this year.

Lancashire supporters, who aired their abundant frustration at a tense annual general meeting on Thursday, are watching their club plunge to ever greater depths. The Lancashire hierarchy last month publicly apologised for a “desperately disappointing” start to the season, while simultaneously reaffirming support for the coaching team. That afternoon, captain Keaton Jennings resigned his position, with the farce deepening when head coach Dale Benkenstein followed a fortnight later after the Leicestershire humbling.

Firmly expected to make an immediate return to Division One after last year’s relegation, the prospect now appears slim for a club operating under an interim head coach and interim captain. One wonders if 42-year-old seamer James Anderson believes it was really worth relacing his spikes. All the more galling is the sight of one of their own flourishing elsewhere. Haseeb Hameed, England’s youngest Test debutant opening batter and a Lancashire product, leads the Division One run-scoring charts at table-topping Nottinghamshire, for whom he is proving an accomplished, understated captain. Continue in such a manner and thoughts of a third international call-up might arise.

Having narrowly avoided relegation last year, Nottinghamshire are the only top-tier side to win four of their seven games, leading the way from three-time reigning champions Surrey and surprise challengers, newly promoted Sussex. Even more impressive is doing so despite peculiar regulations robbing them of their most potent wicket-taker.

With no international caps to his name – and limited T20 experience, which serves as a secondary criterion for a work permit – Australian Fergus O’Neill took 21 wickets in the four matches he managed to cram into his permitted 30 days in the country. Fortunately, pacemen are in healthy supply at Trent Bridge, while Farhan Ahmed, Rehan’s 17-year-old off-spinning brother, is proving that prodigies run in the family with some eye-catching displays.

The Ahmed brothers are currently engaged on England Lions duty against India A, alongside a number of international hopefuls. Chris Woakes – infinitely more experienced than all of them combined – will feature in the second Lions fixture having returned from injury to take six wickets in Warwickshire’s last red-ball outing.

Whether Sam Curran can force an England Test recall will depend on him replicating last week’s red-ball comeback for Surrey, who are quietly poised to pounce when the County Championship returns with its Kookaburra-ball interlude in late June. England’s next Test duties are against India and Australia, for whom Cameron Green revelled in an unlikely early season stint at Gloucestershire, with three centuries in nine innings.

Green’s West Country stay was funded by a sizable donation from an anonymous Gloucestershire member. Even heroin addicts can be shrewd on occasion.

Photograph by John Mallett/Avalon