David Payne hopes powerplay 'super-strength' can propel Gloucestershire to Blast glory

This time last year, David Payne had a difficult decision to make. A persistent ankle niggle had dogged him through 2023, requiring two rounds of surgery. When Luke Wright, the England men's selector, phoned ahead of the Ireland ODIs that preceded last year's 50-over World Cup, Payne had to admit he wasn't fit enough. "That was one of those really difficult ones, to have to turn down that call."

But the big decision revolved around whether or not to move on to a white-ball contract with Gloucestershire. The demands of playing first-class cricket, in which he remains a proven performer, had contributed to Payne's problems with injury. With a goal of playing for England again at the front of his thinking, he chose to sign a three-year extension and put red-ball cricket to one side (although he has not yet retired from the format).

The result, as Payne prepares to spearhead Gloucestershire's tilt at T20 Finals Day, has been "pretty much the perfect summer so far". Payne has enjoyed the most-prolific T20 season of his career and is currently the Blast's joint-leading wicket-taker with 29, having moved level with Danny Briggs after taking a four-wicket haul against Birmingham Bears in last week's quarter-final.

"It probably brought a few more nerves to the first group game [of the season], thinking I'm almost like a one-format player for Gloucestershire now, because of the Hundred - so what if I don't perform in this one format?" Payne tells ESPNcricinfo. "What good am I to the county? But now, the plus sides, and the reasons I'd done it, were mainly for my body and prolonging the career in that sense. I'd had some trouble with my ankle and actually that was the big difference, that I went into that first group game really fresh. I hadn't played six or seven four-day games. My body was always already really sore, or had a niggle or something, and I was actually completely fresh for the probably the first time ever. And it just felt like it made a huge difference physically and mentally, and allowed me to perform at my best."

Payne mapped out the "best-case scenario" for his summer as "having a good Blast and a good Hundred, then hopefully that leading to getting back in England squads." Although the last of those has yet to happen, he is confident that he has put himself in the best position, at 33, to add to his sole ODI appearance against Netherlands in 2022.

Notwithstanding England's apparent transition to a new generation, one factor that may keep Payne on the radar is his effectiveness in the powerplay - an area which has been a weakness with the T20I side for some time. In this year's Blast, Payne has taken 20 of his 29 wickets while fielding restrictions were on; the next-highest is Ollie Robinson of Sussex (Gloucestershire's semi-final opponents) with 14, followed by Olly Stone and Timm van der Gugten on 11.

While this has long been part of Payne's skillset - since 2020 in the Blast, he leads the way with 45 powerplay wickets at 16.88 - he said that an increasingly attacking mindset from batters meant bowling teams placed greater importance on striking with the new ball. As a case in point, he highlighted the quarter-final win over Birmingham defending a low total, in which Gloucestershire's captain, Jack Taylor, kept Payne on for a third over at the top and was rewarded with the key wicket of Moeen Ali.