Shropshire have called up Oswestry duo Joe Carrasco and Warrick Fynn for this weekend’s trip to Bournemouth to face Dorset in the Unicorns Championship.
Bryan Jones, Shropshire’s chairman of selectors, hopes the in-form duo can help provide the runs the county struggled to put on the board when they were beaten at Berkshire, the Western Division leaders, last week.
That was a first defeat of the season in the Championship for Shropshire following wins over Cheshire and Herefordshire and leaves them second in the table, 18 points behind Berkshire, with three matches to play.
Carrasco, pictured, will be making his first county appearance of the season while Fynn returns after playing in the opening Championship match against Cheshire at Shifnal when he contributed with both bat and ball, taking five wickets with his left-arm spin.
They replace Robbie Clarke and Ryan Lockley from the side beaten at Finchampstead.
Jones said: “Apart from Alexei Kervezee, we struggled for runs against Berkshire, so we’ve brought Warrick and Joe into the team. Warrick scored a hundred for Oswestry at Wellington in the Birmingham League last weekend and Joe also scored a hundred recently and has been in good form.
“They are both available to play the rest of the season, which is good news, and hopefully they, along with the other batsmen, can make a good contribution.”
Referring to the Western Division title race, Jones added: “This is probably a must-win game for us in that respect and we also realistically need Berkshire to slip up somewhere, but it’s all to play for and we’re looking forward to going to Bournemouth to play.”
The three-day clash with Dorset starts on Sunday (11am).
Shropshire: Steve Leach (Shifnal, captain), Omar Ali (C&R Hawks), Will Parton (Shrewsbury), Warrick Fynn (Oswestry), Alexei Kervezee (Halesowen), Joe Carrasco (Oswestry), Ross Aucott (Shifnal), Simon Gregory (Bridgnorth), Sam Whitney (Bridgnorth), Gurjit Sandhu (Twickenham), Alex Wyatt (Shifnal). 12th man: Jack Edwards (Shifnal).