Derbyshire C.C. Transfers

PLAYERS COMING IN

Unquestionably Derbyshire's finest piece of business following the close of the 2009 season, was luring back their Australian captain Chris Rogers to lead the side once more and continue the excellent work he put in last season.

Derby missed out on promotion only on the penultimate day of the season, and it was Rogers' 1461 County Championship runs that made them so difficult to beat. He has carried that form back to his homeland, where he has currently made 456 runs at 65.14 in the Sheffield Shield.

To complement Rogers, Derbyshire's Head of Cricket John Morris, has swooped to bring in another player with international pedigree in South Africa's Robin Peterson, who has been signed as a kolpak player. Peterson,30, has represented the Proteas in six Test matches, taking 14 wickets at 35.50, but featured more prominently for the ODI side where he appeared 35 times.

The canny left-arm spinner and powerful striker of the ball will be an excellent addition to the one-day side, but should also play a part in the longer format. His experience of playing at the top level will add more know-how to the ranks.

If there was a relatively obvious weakness in the Derby side of 2009, it was the lack of genuine matchwinning firepower to propel them to more outright victories. So aswell as making Steffan Jones a more permanent fixture at the club, after he put pen to paper on a two year deal following his successful loan spell for the second half of last season, he has also swooped for Notts paceman Mark Footit.

Footit, now 24, is still a novice in terms of first-class experience, with only nine appearances to his name, and was restricted to mainly second XI cricket last season. But with that in mind he will bring with him a desire to succeed at his new county, and firstly forge a place in the starting XI to get a chance he may believe he never fully received at Trent Bridge.

Injuries have undoubtedly played their part, and when fully fit is capable of hurling the ball down at decent speeds, with a hint of swing from his left-arm action. At 6'2" he will also hope to extract a fair amount of bounce from receptive tracks.

Returning to the County Ground is wicket-keeper Lee Goddard, who after leaving the club in 2007 served as Phil Mustard's understudy at Durham without a great deal of first-team action. Back at Derby he will hope to claim the keeping gloves and will relish some first-team action.


CONTRACT EXTENSIONS

Bowling trio Tim Groenewald, Tom Lungley and Ian Hunter have all penned deals to remain at the club. Groenewald led the way last season topping the bowling averages with 34 wickets at 27.08.


LEAVING DERBY...

West Indian batsman Wavell Hinds has not had his contract renewed, with the Kolpak rulings become stricter and the penalisation of the number of kolpak players involved, Derby decided not to renew Hinds contract.

Leg spinner Mark Lawson has also been released along with Stephen Stubbings, Dan Birch, Dom Telo, Charl Langeveldt and Stuart Law, while Jamie Pipe has retired.