Sussex head to Cheltenham for Championship encounter with Gloucestershire

After a fine start to the tournament, Sussex pause their Vitality Blast campaign for two matches in the Specsavers County Championship.

The first of these starts on Monday against Gloucestershire at the picturesque Cheltenham College outground.

Jason Gillespie has named a 13-man squad for the trip to the edge of the Cotswolds, with Chris Jordan in line for his first Championship appearance of the season.

Tom Haines – who made his maiden first-class hundred in Sussex’s previous match against Durham at Arundel Castle – is recovering from a head impact sustained in training and so has not been considered for selection.

Laurie Evans has also been ruled out after injuring his left hamstring during Friday evening’s Vitality Blast fixture with Surrey.

Head coach, Gillespie said this ahead of the game: “We’re looking forward to playing this Championship match after a short block of T20.

“We know Gloucestershire are a very good team and we will need to be at our best to compete with them.

“Cheltenham is a lovely ground and we’re really excited about the opportunity to play there.”

Sussex sit in fourth place in the division two after six matches, 13 points behind third place Leicestershire who – like every other side in the division other than Gloucestershire - have played a game more. Kent are 34 points ahead in second, while Warwickshire lead the way with 123 points.

A number of Sussex players are approaching career milestones which could be reached over the course of the next four days. Jofra Archer needs eight more wickets for 100 first-class dismissals; 19 runs will take skipper Ben Brown to 6,000 first-class runs and three wickets would give David Wiese 300 in his first-class career.

Sussex Sharks squad

26. Ben Brown (capt. & wk)

22. Jofra Archer

18. Will Beer

21. Danny Briggs

5. Michael Burgess

6. Harry Finch

8. Chris Jordan

9. Delray Rawlins

25. Ollie Robinson

28. Phil Salt

31. Luke Wells

96. David Wiese

10. Luke Wright

Opposition

Gloucestershire sit at the foot of a congested second half of the division two table with one win and three draws from their six matches.

Their victory came in the opening round of the competition when they took down Kent by five wickets at Canterbury.

James Bracey is the side’s leading run scorer having made hundreds against Middlesex and Glamorgan.

Ryan Higgins is the leading wicket taker with 22 at 18.81. Eight of those came in the rain-affected draw against Sussex at The 1st Central County Ground in April.

Match coverage

Play gets underway at 11am on all four days of the match. Visit the Sussex Cricket Match Day Centre for a live scorecard, live statistics and text updates from the @SussexCCC twitter feed.

The Sussex Cricket Match Day Centre also includes a link to BBC Sussex’s ball-by-ball radio commentary.