It's 5/6 but line is close to 10 points off so I still think great value.   It's not one of the markets covered by oddschecker unfortunately and I've not checked other bookies as B365 is the only UK bookie I can get on with.  WH usually offer this market but just checked and it's not up yet - maybe worth waiting 24 hours and hoping it's widely available if you can't get on with b365

Not sure if you have bet anything for Finals Day.  There's 1 bet I really like - Grant Elliott has been priced at O/U 34.5 player points (1 per run, 10 per catch, 25 per wicket).  It seems low for a player who always bowls, fields in key positions and bats at 4 or 5.  I had a quick look at his games this season:

runs / wickets / catches (points)
18 / 0 / 1 (28)
38 / 0 / 2 (58)*
21 / 1 / 0  (46)*
18 / 2 / 0  (68)*
14 / 0 / 1  (24)
0 / 4 / 0  (100)*
16 / 1 / 1  (51)
45 / 1 / 1  (80)*
23 / 0 / 0  (23)
38 / 1 / 0  (63)*
0 / 0 / 0  (0)
0 / 1 / 1  (35)
1 / 0 / 0  (1)
59 / 0 / 0  (59)
*indicates home game at Edgbaston

The over bet would have won on 9 of his 14 games this season, and 2 of the games it lost were very one sided where he didn't get to bat.  He's played 6 games at Edgbaston and it won all 6 times.  Not only that but it covered very comfortably each time (lowest score was 46) so a definite trend in games at Edgbaston.  I've only checked B365 but I imagine any other site offering it will have a similar line.  I'd put the O/U in the early/mid 40s if I were pricing it

Top Bowler - If they go with the line up I expect (Sibley, Pollock, Hose, Hain, Elliott, DeGrandhomme, Thomason, Ambrose, Woakes, Patel, Stone) then Stone, Woakes and Patel will bowl 4 each, with the other 8 being made up between Elliott, CDGH, Thomason & Sibley.  Woakes hasn't even been priced up by most bookies, so hard to do anything with the current market.

Top Bat - Bell joint favourite in most places, I can't see him playing though which opens things up a bit. Presuming things don't go horribly wrong the winner will come from the top 6 - Adam Hose comes in at 3 and will play very aggressively so he's got every chance if he bats for any period of time.   I'd price him at 4/1 max so if you can get the 9/2 at BetVictor then it's a decent fun value bet

Not a lot of value in the outright market.  The Bears look appropriately priced being given a 55% chance to make the final.  If they were to make the final, then given the home advantage and extra rest from playing in G1, they'd definitely be a favourite over Hampshire and no more than a small dog to Notts.  The 10/3 available on us earlier in the week was great value.  The 3/1 at has a little value and the widely available 11/4 is the break even price IMO.  FWIW you'd have to be mad to back Notts at 7/4 - I'm sure they will still get most of the public action, even at this price, which is why the bookies can get away with such short odds on them

have to play the extra batsman (even if it is the expansive malan)

4 seamers plus moeen is fine.

dawson is aluxury we can't afford

I agree...  No idea why Bayliss is so insistent that playing the extra batsman is a luxury that takes away responsibility from the top 6.  It adds a lot more value to this team than a half decent bowler that can bat a bit - can always use Root for a few overs a game if needs be (and more often than not he won't be needed).  Stokes at 7, Ali at 8 and Woakes (when fit) at 9 makes for a very strong lower-middle order and all are good enough as part of a 5 man attack. 

Welcome back, it's been way too long since you last posted.

Post more please.

Thanks - i'll certainly try!

Team for the next test:
Cook, Jennings, Westley, Root, Bairstow, Stokes, Moeen, Dawson/Malan, Broad, Anderson, Wood/Roland-Jones

Great that Westley has been given a chance.  Would have preferred Stoneman over Jennings but can see the logic behind giving him 1 or 2 more tests so no problem with that decision.  No idea how Malan gets picked ahead of Sam Robson.  Finally, what the fuck is Dawson still doing in the squad... either pick Rashid or play the extra batsman

Had a quick look but doesn't look like you have a bet for the County Championship season.  I saw Tighty tipped Warwickshire at 13/2 on the Betting Emporium newsletter and think that's a pretty solid bet.  Haven't got time to do a full analysis of all the teams but I'll look at Warwickshire since that's the team I know very well, and the bet Tighty suggested...

The batting looks really strong for a change.  The top 5 will be Chopra, Westwood, Bell, Trott, Hain.  Sam Hain will play for England and is more than capable of 1000 runs this season.  He qualifies for England this September and whilst that will be too early for him, if he can keep scoring runs it shouldn't take long (currently averaging over 41 from 23 Div 1 games).  His top score was 28 in his 4 pre-season innings and 25 was his top score in his last 6 Championship innings last year, so that's a bit of a worry but with Porterfield (Ireland captain) and Evans (more and more reliable these days) waiting there is plenty of backup.  Fingers crossed Chopra without the captaincy will score 1000+ again (like he was every year until he took the role on).  No need to talk about Bell or Trott, arguably the strongest 3 & 4 combo the CC has seen in the modern era.  The middle order of Ambrose, Woakes and Clarke is very strong and have got the top order out of trouble time and time again over the years, although they shouldn't have that pressure this season.  The "tail" will feature the likes of Barker, Patel, Wright (all averaging 20+) and Rankin/Hannon-Dalby (actual tail-enders!)

Bowling has more depth than any county (Yorkshire included), although Yorkshire can certainly boast a better 1st team attack.  Jeetan Patel will lead the spin department, although Poysden will be pushing to break into the 1st team late in the season when 2 spinners can be justified.  I think Javed (other spinner) will be used almost exclusively as a 1 day bowler this season but is a more than capable with bat & ball if needed.  The pace attack will be constantly rotated - allrounders Clarke and Woakes should play every game, then I guess the likes of Wright, Barker, Rankin, Hannon-Dalby and Jones will be competing for 2 spots based around form/freshness, although the later 2 are mainly used in shorter forms of the game.  With 10 bowlers competing for 5 spots, injuries shouldn't be a problem, especially when you consider only Woakes has any chance of an international call up (I checked Ireland's fixtures and Rankin should only miss 1 CC game this season).  2-3 seasons ago pretty much every single 1st team bowler got called up for England, England A, Ireland or New Zealand. 

So, plenty of positives.  I can see 3 problems:

a) Bell getting back in the England team would leave a massive hole in the batting and captaincy.  Woakes is the vice-captain and will take over in this scenario, which seems bizarre given that he is the other player England will almost certainly call upon during the summer. 

b) For (almost) 2 seasons Warwickshire were competing for all 3 trophies.  After a 1st/2nd/2nd in 2014, we looked set for a similar return in 2015 only for it to go completely tits up. They never showed up for 20/20 Finals Day, lost 2 County Championship games by very small margins at crucial times in the season and got knocked out by rain in the other competition because their dreadful start meant they had to win the final group game. At the time I put it down to burnout, to keep that intensity in that many competitions for 2 seasons would have been almost impossible - I guess it's the equivalent of a PL team competing for the treble 2 years running. EVERY single other team were able to prioritise tournaments by the time they get to a certain point in a season (either 2014 or 2015 or in most cases both) and rest key players whilst giving youngsters a chance.  I found out recently that it looks like this was only partly the case and there was quite a lot of dressing room unrest.  Reading between the lines, it seems Chopra would have been gone as captain even if Bell hadn't been dropped by England.  There's a decent possibility that whatever the problem was hasn't gone away and may re-appear at some point during the season.

c) Going on from the last point, burnout is a real possibility for what is no longer a young squad. I saw this article earlier - http://www.skysports.com/cricket/news/12140/10216791/county-cricket-2016-sky-sports-pundits-make-their-predictions. 3 "experts" who all predict Warwickshire to win a trophy this year, the problem being they all predict a different one!  A good problem to have as a team but not so good if you want to bet on them in 1 competition

There was actually a 4th problem that got solved this morning....  that being the amount we relied on Tim Ambrose - he's been doing double overtime for years now.  It's been a long time since we had a decent backup, and McKay who we'd been trying for a few years was let go over the winter, leaving us with some guy we picked up from the minor counties. Thankfully today they announced Luke Ronchi has signed for the entire 20/20 campaign - it's definitely the area we'll miss Ambrose least, so he can rest up during those games and should be fresh enough for the rest of the season 

Yorkshire can't possibly be value at 6/4 when we are looking at the strongest division 1 ever seen, and I've got absolutely no interest in backing Durham or Lancashire at their odds.  Those 3 teams are the ones I expect to suffer the most with the new toss rule, as historically they've had more bowling friendly conditions at the start of games.  Notts were so strong at the end of last year, maybe they take that momentum with them?  Problem is, they are always one of the top 4 favourites and are always out of contention by half way through the season - they are the same price as Warwickshire and I'd want more than that for a team who've never shown consistency throughout a whole season.  I do make them 3rd favourites though.  Middlesex are on of the teams I was referring to earlier - they finished 2nd last season but effectively only played 1 competition, they were so woeful in other formats that they could write them off at a very early stage and just concentrate on the CC.  That won't be the case this year and judging from their signings it looks like they will take limited overs cricket a lot more seriously.  Justifiably 4th favourites and too short to consider backing.  Surrey are the team I know least about, although having read up on them a bit I have no idea how they can be almost the same price as Warwickshire!  Hampshire are 20/1 outsiders and such is the competitiveness of this division, I wouldn't want to be laying any bigger than that - problem is they are so much stronger at limited overs cricket and with such an old team that seems to lack depth, there is no way they can compete on all 3 fronts and I can't back them at that price either.

So, Warwickshire do seem nice value to me.  I was thinking 2 or 3 weeks ago about posting the bet here at 13/2 but decided against it purely on the basis I actually think the 12/1 on us winning the 1 day cup is better value.  I didn't want to post 2 bets on the 1 team I support, especially when I tipped us last season as well!  Thankfully Tighty suggested the County Championship bet (http://www.oddschecker.com/cricket/county-championship-div-1/county-championship-division-1/winner) so I can agree with that, whilst myself recommending the 12/1 on us winning the One Day Cup (http://www.oddschecker.com/cricket/royal-london-one-day-cup/winner).  Before last year we had a 1st, 2nd and 2nd over a 4 year period in this competition.  If Bell gets called up for England I think the 12/1 is a very fair price, if he doesn't the 12/1 is a great price.

Hi, shall we leave the royal london for nearer the time? no need to bet it yet is there?

the 13/2 for SSCC1 has gone. probably taken by the BE guys yesterday

the only 6/1 we can take is ladbrokes. who limited us to £1.17 e/w

so thats that. its not value below sixes.

Did you ever get on Warwickshire for the RL Cup?  If so then I'd lay it off, especially if it wasn't e/w.  It's rare I lay off a long term bet but I did a few days ago as I really think Surrey should be (small) favourites tomorrow instead of it being priced as a 50/50 game.  Surrey seem to be a team on the up, whereas we are firmly at last chance saloon for alot of our players after a 2nd year in a row where the (relatively old) squad have capitulated in the 2nd half of the season. 

Apologies if you didn't get on, I should have reminded you closer to the time.

Had a look at the other markets - B365 have Jeetan Patel @4.5 to be top Warwickshire wicket taker, which is definitely too big.  Since you can't get on there, I'd take the 4.33 at 10Bet or NetBet if you have an account there.  Would leave it at 3/1 but maybe the 16/1 on him being MoM is a decent alternative.  Not expecting it turn massively but he's so good/reliable and was by far our best bowler when we made the final a couple of years ago

Also, Surrey to score highest in the first 15 overs looks a decent price at 1.9 (http://www.oddschecker.com/cricket/royal-london-one-day-cup/surrey-v-warwickshire/highest-first-15-overs).   Opening the batting it's Davies and Roy vs Hain and Trott - no brainer really, especially since Bell and Sangakarra are very similar number , and you'd expect the vast majority of balls in the opening 15 overs to be faced by the top 3. 

They need a strong finish here otherwise that excellent innings will be wasted.  The pitch looks excellent and Notts have a long batting line up, 170 minimum

I'll enter these please:

3. £50 Classic
4. £20 H2H
5. £30 Cups package
6. £20 Last Man Standing

I'll paypal you now

England today announced that Finn will replace Stokes in the team for the test starting tomorrow.

Pakistan are 4/1 on most sites to win this test, while I know they got a kicking last game, this England team doesn't FIL me with much confidence.

Vince, Balance and hales are all out of form and struggling, as is Ali, with both bat and ball.

Now Finn, who has been out of form for ages, has been brought in, a lot relies on Woakes, Anderson and Broad to get 20 wickets, and Root, Cook and Bairstow with the bat.

It feels like we could be carrying a bit of dead weight?

Thoughts?

It's drizzled all day here at Edgbaston but the forecast looks fairly grey but dry for the whole test so it's impossible to back the draw at the current price.  So yeah, wouldn't argue that Pakistan look decent value.  I'd still rather wait for the toss even if it will be less important in this game than any other in the series

Northants v Warwickshire Birmingham tonight.  Odds look about right, normally you'd have Northants as favourites at home but with no Ben Duckett and Birmingham naming a relatively strong squad I'd say if anything Birmingham should be very small favourites.  Woakes not playing obviously, Chopra controversially left out yet again and Rankin injured, but aside from that it's close to full strength. I wish Birmingham would just pick their best team in this competition but they seem insistent upon playing 2-4 younger / reserve players in almost every game as part of their rotation policy and to make sure they can put out their best XI in every Championship game. 

Anyway, they abandoned that policy in the last game as it got to the point where we needed wins and looks once again they'll pick a strong team meaning Barker will play.  He's been on fire this season and tops the MVP ratings for the county championship.  Having an excellent season with bat and ball, priced at 25/1 for man of the match is probably due to the fact the bookies will rarely have seen him in this format.  Presuming he plays (he's in the squad but may be "rested" so wait until the teams are announced) then could be a fun bet if you're interested.  Will bat at 8 (or maybe 9 if they go with the extra batsman again) so his impact with the bat could be limited but even taking that into account it's got to be +EV

http://www.oddschecker.com/cricket/natwest-t20-blast/northamptonshire-v-birmingham/man-of-the-match

Barker playing and batting at 8

I thought Warwickshire's statement about Chopra leaving at the end of the season was particularly transparent:

"Both parties believe that now is a good time for Varun to accept a fresh challenge"

Blimey! None of this "mutual consent" or "spending more time with the family" euphemising. "He doesn't like us anymore. We don't like him anymore. Tarra an a bit."

Parting is such sweet sorrow...or sometimes not. Shame to lose such a good player, nevertheless.

Completely agree, whole thing is a mess.  He's the best opener we've got and the best opener we've had since Nick Knight retired.  I can only presume it's a fallout from when he lost the captaincy.  They seem completely reluctant to play him in any limited overs stuff.  The one time they literally had no choice because of injuries he scores 98 not out in a T20 game and that remains his only appearance in white ball cricket. 

Northants v Warwickshire Birmingham tonight.  Odds look about right, normally you'd have Northants as favourites at home but with no Ben Duckett and Birmingham naming a relatively strong squad I'd say if anything Birmingham should be very small favourites.  Woakes not playing obviously, Chopra controversially left out yet again and Rankin injured, but aside from that it's close to full strength. I wish Birmingham would just pick their best team in this competition but they seem insistent upon playing 2-4 younger / reserve players in almost every game as part of their rotation policy and to make sure they can put out their best XI in every Championship game. 

Anyway, they abandoned that policy in the last game as it got to the point where we needed wins and looks once again they'll pick a strong team meaning Barker will play.  He's been on fire this season and tops the MVP ratings for the county championship.  Having an excellent season with bat and ball, priced at 25/1 for man of the match is probably due to the fact the bookies will rarely have seen him in this format.  Presuming he plays (he's in the squad but may be "rested" so wait until the teams are announced) then could be a fun bet if you're interested.  Will bat at 8 (or maybe 9 if they go with the extra batsman again) so his impact with the bat could be limited but even taking that into account it's got to be +EV

http://www.oddschecker.com/cricket/natwest-t20-blast/northamptonshire-v-birmingham/man-of-the-match

What do we think is a winning total for Pakistan? 270 ahead? 4th innings wicket with the best leggie in the world?

England will be favourites if they are set 270.  Think the bookies will have the number at around 300-320 for a 50/50 game

Thanks Tighty, can't remember my stack size,  it's £140kish

Completely agree about the toss, both Surrey and Somerset look more than a fair price in this weeks games.  It's another reason why I think Durham are too big a price to go down this year.

And yeah, no rush with the 1 Day Cup bet as it's a long way off starting - I suspect the 12/1 will be gone in a few weeks but should still get 11/1

Had a quick look but doesn't look like you have a bet for the County Championship season.  I saw Tighty tipped Warwickshire at 13/2 on the Betting Emporium newsletter and think that's a pretty solid bet.  Haven't got time to do a full analysis of all the teams but I'll look at Warwickshire since that's the team I know very well, and the bet Tighty suggested...

The batting looks really strong for a change.  The top 5 will be Chopra, Westwood, Bell, Trott, Hain.  Sam Hain will play for England and is more than capable of 1000 runs this season.  He qualifies for England this September and whilst that will be too early for him, if he can keep scoring runs it shouldn't take long (currently averaging over 41 from 23 Div 1 games).  His top score was 28 in his 4 pre-season innings and 25 was his top score in his last 6 Championship innings last year, so that's a bit of a worry but with Porterfield (Ireland captain) and Evans (more and more reliable these days) waiting there is plenty of backup.  Fingers crossed Chopra without the captaincy will score 1000+ again (like he was every year until he took the role on).  No need to talk about Bell or Trott, arguably the strongest 3 & 4 combo the CC has seen in the modern era.  The middle order of Ambrose, Woakes and Clarke is very strong and have got the top order out of trouble time and time again over the years, although they shouldn't have that pressure this season.  The "tail" will feature the likes of Barker, Patel, Wright (all averaging 20+) and Rankin/Hannon-Dalby (actual tail-enders!)

Bowling has more depth than any county (Yorkshire included), although Yorkshire can certainly boast a better 1st team attack.  Jeetan Patel will lead the spin department, although Poysden will be pushing to break into the 1st team late in the season when 2 spinners can be justified.  I think Javed (other spinner) will be used almost exclusively as a 1 day bowler this season but is a more than capable with bat & ball if needed.  The pace attack will be constantly rotated - allrounders Clarke and Woakes should play every game, then I guess the likes of Wright, Barker, Rankin, Hannon-Dalby and Jones will be competing for 2 spots based around form/freshness, although the later 2 are mainly used in shorter forms of the game.  With 10 bowlers competing for 5 spots, injuries shouldn't be a problem, especially when you consider only Woakes has any chance of an international call up (I checked Ireland's fixtures and Rankin should only miss 1 CC game this season).  2-3 seasons ago pretty much every single 1st team bowler got called up for England, England A, Ireland or New Zealand.  

So, plenty of positives.  I can see 3 problems:

a) Bell getting back in the England team would leave a massive hole in the batting and captaincy.  Woakes is the vice-captain and will take over in this scenario, which seems bizarre given that he is the other player England will almost certainly call upon during the summer.  

b) For (almost) 2 seasons Warwickshire were competing for all 3 trophies.  After a 1st/2nd/2nd in 2014, we looked set for a similar return in 2015 only for it to go completely tits up. They never showed up for 20/20 Finals Day, lost 2 County Championship games by very small margins at crucial times in the season and got knocked out by rain in the other competition because their dreadful start meant they had to win the final group game. At the time I put it down to burnout, to keep that intensity in that many competitions for 2 seasons would have been almost impossible - I guess it's the equivalent of a PL team competing for the treble 2 years running. EVERY single other team were able to prioritise tournaments by the time they get to a certain point in a season (either 2014 or 2015 or in most cases both) and rest key players whilst giving youngsters a chance.  I found out recently that it looks like this was only partly the case and there was quite a lot of dressing room unrest.  Reading between the lines, it seems Chopra would have been gone as captain even if Bell hadn't been dropped by England.  There's a decent possibility that whatever the problem was hasn't gone away and may re-appear at some point during the season.

c) Going on from the last point, burnout is a real possibility for what is no longer a young squad. I saw this article earlier - http://www.skysports.com/cricket/news/12140/10216791/county-cricket-2016-sky-sports-pundits-make-their-predictions. 3 "experts" who all predict Warwickshire to win a trophy this year, the problem being they all predict a different one!  A good problem to have as a team but not so good if you want to bet on them in 1 competition

There was actually a 4th problem that got solved this morning....  that being the amount we relied on Tim Ambrose - he's been doing double overtime for years now.  It's been a long time since we had a decent backup, and McKay who we'd been trying for a few years was let go over the winter, leaving us with some guy we picked up from the minor counties. Thankfully today they announced Luke Ronchi has signed for the entire 20/20 campaign - it's definitely the area we'll miss Ambrose least, so he can rest up during those games and should be fresh enough for the rest of the season  

Yorkshire can't possibly be value at 6/4 when we are looking at the strongest division 1 ever seen, and I've got absolutely no interest in backing Durham or Lancashire at their odds.  Those 3 teams are the ones I expect to suffer the most with the new toss rule, as historically they've had more bowling friendly conditions at the start of games.  Notts were so strong at the end of last year, maybe they take that momentum with them?  Problem is, they are always one of the top 4 favourites and are always out of contention by half way through the season - they are the same price as Warwickshire and I'd want more than that for a team who've never shown consistency throughout a whole season.  I do make them 3rd favourites though.  Middlesex are on of the teams I was referring to earlier - they finished 2nd last season but effectively only played 1 competition, they were so woeful in other formats that they could write them off at a very early stage and just concentrate on the CC.  That won't be the case this year and judging from their signings it looks like they will take limited overs cricket a lot more seriously.  Justifiably 4th favourites and too short to consider backing.  Surrey are the team I know least about, although having read up on them a bit I have no idea how they can be almost the same price as Warwickshire!  Hampshire are 20/1 outsiders and such is the competitiveness of this division, I wouldn't want to be laying any bigger than that - problem is they are so much stronger at limited overs cricket and with such an old team that seems to lack depth, there is no way they can compete on all 3 fronts and I can't back them at that price either.

So, Warwickshire do seem nice value to me.  I was thinking 2 or 3 weeks ago about posting the bet here at 13/2 but decided against it purely on the basis I actually think the 12/1 on us winning the 1 day cup is better value.  I didn't want to post 2 bets on the 1 team I support, especially when I tipped us last season as well!  Thankfully Tighty suggested the County Championship bet (http://www.oddschecker.com/cricket/county-championship-div-1/county-championship-division-1/winner) so I can agree with that, whilst myself recommending the 12/1 on us winning the One Day Cup (http://www.oddschecker.com/cricket/royal-london-one-day-cup/winner).  Before last year we had a 1st, 2nd and 2nd over a 4 year period in this competition.  If Bell gets called up for England I think the 12/1 is a very fair price, if he doesn't the 12/1 is a great price.