Worcestershire achieved their pre-season goals of winning double promotion and creating a happy dressing room. Steve Rhodes, the director of cricket, chose his overseas players wisely with Phil Jaques, Lou Vincent and Zaheer Khan all making significant contributions on the pitch and helping create a happy glow off it. Graeme Hick basked in the warmth. The decision to drop him to No.5 had seemed to signal the beginning of the end; instead he finished a good season by passing 1,000 first-class runs for the 20th time and rejecting an offer from Derbyshire. Worcestershire’s Championship promotion was all the more worthy because they were heavily beaten in their first two home games. The second promotion, in the one-day league, came after favourable results elsewhere and was so unexpected that Rhodes spent the day fishing rather than monitoring the scores. There also are signs of progress off the field, too. The club is in the process of securing £10m to redevelop New Road, which will include a new pavilion to replace the historic building currently rotting away after a century of flood damage.

Paul Bolton The Wisden Cricketer