Weather woe ruins return

We were all very keen to get back into championship cricket after a break of over a month and it’s just a shame that the weather didn’t help us in our game against Durham at Chester le Street.

We lost the whole of the first day’s play and the first session of day two so it was a big ask to try and get a result but we very nearly did!

I have to admit that we started off a bit shakily and lost three wickets with not many runs on the board before Zander de Bruyn and James Hildreth shared a good partnership, which was followed by a stand between Pete Trego and Craig Kieswetter and in the end we were happy to score 350.

We the bowled well to get them at 140 for six before they mounted a bit of a lower order rescue, which was not expected because they are a good side and bat quite a way down with the likes of Liam Plunkett who can get runs. We didn’t help ourselves either because we dropped a couple of catches.

We then batted again and set them a total, which was never easy playing against a bowling attack that included Steve Harmison on his own home patch who was sending it down at getting on for 90mph, but we did set them a target.

They lost two quick wickets after which I don’t think that were ever really interested in chasing it down so in the end we had to settle for 11 points which takes us up the table a bit in addition to which we have still got a game in hand over most of the other teams in the top division.

It was good to see James Hildreth back in the runs during the Durham game and he batted really aggressively. He would be the first to admit that he hasn’t enjoyed the best of form in recent games so it was good to see him very nearly get 50 in each innings.

Our current match against Kent is another that we must try to win, but they are few and far between in this division. However we have targeted them as a team that we can beat so will be going all out to work towards getting that result.

As soon as the championship match against Kent is over on Saturday we set off by coach for Arundel where we play Sussex in our opening Pro40 match of the season and I have to admit that I am looking forward to it.

I have always liked the Pro40 it’s a good format of the game and I have enjoyed success playing against Sussex when I scored a century down at Hove a few years ago.

After the match at Arundel we fly up to Durham for a floodlit Pro40 on Wednesday night after which we are away at Lords on Monday the following week, so we have got a lot of travelling in our opening three matches.
However if we can grind out a couple of wins on our travels then we will have got our 40 over campaign off to a good start

Time for a rest

Since I last played cricket a couple of weeks ago I have had a few days of complete rest which was very much needed because a lot of the niggling injuries that have built up have been getting on top of me so it was good for me to get away.

Last week I started back with Darren Veness doing two gym sessions per day for five days and now this week we are back working on our game and into the swing of things.

I have had a few hits in the nets this week and I have been very pleased with the way that I was striking the ball which is a good sign and put my mind at rest as to how I am now playing.

I was also pleased with the way the ball was coming out when I was bowling so it’s been a pretty productive time away for me and a good lead up to our return to championship cricket against Durham on Friday.

With 10 championship matches still to be played only six points separate the second team from the team which is third from the bottom of division one so it’s a pretty close thing and every game is going to be hard fought.

It’s been a while since we played a four- day game at Chester le Street because the last time we met it was at Stockton. The last time was probably soon after the Riverside wicket had just been laid and you could say that it was a little ‘fruity’.

Obviously the wicket has changed since those early days and we have played some one day games up there since and it is now a pretty good cricket wicket.

At the Riverside if the seamers put the ball in good areas early on it will help them, but the wicket also tends to spin after a couple of days so we should have an interesting game of cricket between two good teams.

Although we won’t have Andy Caddick back with us just yet there are several other bowlers waiting in the wings like Ben Phillips, Steffan Jones and Mark Turner as well as Pete Trego who missed out on the last championship match.

There are a lot of players who are waiting to come back into the reckoning and fight for his place.

I am sure that Durham will have a pretty tasty seam attack with the likes of Steve Harmison and Graham Onions but this is what first division cricket is all about- there are not many weak attacks at that level of the game.

This is a massive game I think because we know that the next three games after the break are going to decide whether or not we are going to be challenging for the title or just a middle of the table team.
We need to put in a couple of big performances and let other teams know that we are in the first division to stay by getting the results to prove it and I know that we are all certainly well up for it.

Losing wickets in clusters cost us dear

It was hugely disappointing that we didn’t qualify for the quarter-finals of this year’s Twenty 20 Cup. We were very inconsistent in the competition and this was reflected in our results.

The key factors were losing wickets in clusters in a lot of the games, which you can’t afford to do when you have only got a short innings which I think was proven with the opposition who beat us.

We know we let ourselves down and we also know that this is something that we are going to have to rectify going into the Pro40, which starts for us on Sunday July 20th when we travel to Arundel to play against Sussex.

The massive game for us in the Twenty20 was up at Warwickshire where Justin Langer and Marcus Trescothick got us off to a brilliant start, but then both got out in the same over, which is a cardinal sin in any form of cricket.

We then lost five wickets in a short period which really cost us dear. Even so we still managed to score 178 which we believed was enough runs to defend. I don’t think that our bowling kicked in that game. Everything went against us and they played some good cricket.

When you are top of the league those sorts of games go for you whereas when you are fighting to get a win you maybe try too hard.

In the first three games we got off to good starts but our batting let us down in the middle order and we couldn’t post big enough totals.

Looking back over the whole tournament I think we were probably not quite good enough in all of the games we played.

I have been disappointed with myself in the Twenty20 this year, which within a team’s disappointment as well, has probably highlighted that I haven’t done so well- but its just one of those things.

I have maybe tried too hard, looking at what the bigger picture is with the England Premier League coming on board, the IPL is very much to the forefront and there is an England Twenty20 tournament as well and they are obviously looking for players to pick for that.

Maybe I looked a bit too far ahead instead of the present stuff and what I should be thinking of, which is every individual performance for Somerset and maybe that has backfired on me thinking that I am better than I am in the Twenty20.

The IPL would be another challenge for me. Pitting yourself against the best in the world, in a league which is the best in the world because they are buying the best players, is something Id like to think that I could do a job in.

I am not saying that I would definitely go well out there but I am a confident guy and there is room for English guys to go out and play in that. Whether that is me or somebody else I don’t know but you have got to back that up with performances in the domestic Twenty20 which is something I haven’t done this year.

I have got a couple of niggles which haven’t disappeared, which have been a concern for this year and last year so I have been given a few days rest. The game against South Africa was targeted for me for a personal rest leading up to the Durham game to enable me to get myself more fresh after all the intense cricket during the first half of the season.
I am happy to have some time to re-charge the batteries before going up to Durham in a positive frame of mind, ready for the second half of the season.

We're up and running

Its nice to have got our Twenty20 campaign up and running at last, but I guess it would have been nicer if we hadn’t lost our first three games because it is going to be quite difficult for us to qualify from here.

However given the team that we have and the way that we have played in our last few matches we all know that we can still do it. It is possible and as long as we keep hanging on in there and picking up the two points from each game then you never know.

I think we got to the stage where we had nothing to lose and went out there and played with no fear. We put in a performance and got the result that we needed against Glamorgan.

Previously we have lost wickets in clumps so we wanted to focus on the middle order and up at Worcester, Pete Trego and myself batted for about 10 overs and put some runs on the board which enabled us to reach a good total.

It was really important that we realised that even though we have lost a couple of wickets early on there were still a lot of wickets left so we had time to get runs.

Pete is on a bit of a roll at the moment and he is striking the ball well. One thing that he does do is back himself, so he needs to go out there and play exactly the way that he has been whether it is bowling or batting. He is showing that even when he plays just as a batsman, like he is now because of his injury that goes up the batting order because he is scoring runs for us.

It has been good for me to run into a bit of form in the Twenty20 now. Early on it wasn’t happening for me but I think if you can get stuck in and play your favourite shots, the ones that are risk free then things happen naturally.

Batting first and putting scores on the board creates a lot of pressure when we bowl at our opponents.

We know that here at Taunton where there is a good wicket that if you can put 180 on the board, chasing nine an over right from the start is a big ask and creates pressure for the side batting second right from the beginning.

With Charl Willoughby coming back into the team we have got a left armer who swings it and he has proved to be mighty effective and exactly what we have needed.

Alfonso Thomas has also responded magnificently to being asked to bowl for the last four overs from one end. He bowls his Yorkers so well that with eight overs to go he is the perfect bowler to bring on. He has got a field that he knows and he asked the captain if he could set his own field which has worked out superbly.

Now we have got three big games and we have to win them all. It is now all in our hands and we have to keep playing positively in exactly the way that we have been playing. We can’t leave it to chance and have to go out and take maximum points from the next three games.
It will be a huge disappointment if we don’t qualify and we will be kicking ourselves so if in the end that is the case we will be looking to rectify things in the Pro40.

A disappointing start

We have had a very disappointing start to the Twenty20 Cup campaign this year especially as this was one of the competitions that we earmarked as one of our strongest before the start of the season.

Things just haven’t happened yet for us this season and we have been poor in the middle order of our batting and been unable to see games home.

Having lost three games on the trot it is going to be difficult for us, but there is still a long way to go so if we can string together a run of victories we are still in with a shout. We are looking forward to notching up our first win when we play against Glamorgan at home and then moving on from there.

In our first match of the series we were chasing 202 to win. Justin Langer and Marcus Trescothick gave us a flying start but when you are chasing 10 an over for the second part of the game it is not easy. Northants also bowled very well, especially Jason Brown who is very experienced so I guess we knew that we were going to be up against it.

In Cardiff I think 170 was just out of our reach, 20 more than the 150 wicket that we thought that it was. Their three spinners bowled well and even though the ball didn’t spin very much we played some poor shots. Again we had a good start and looked like we were going to chase it down but then three or four quick wickets and we were in trouble.

This was another middle order fault so this is something that we need to look to rectify.

In the game on Saturday against Warwickshire it was the same story really and after another good start by the opening two we just threw wickets away. Neither James Hildreth nor myself have got any runs in this competition and we are desperate to do do.

We have both been working very hard in the nets trying to improvise and work out how we can score before we go for the bigger shots so we will be hoping to put some runs on the board to help us to win our remaining matches.

I think that what we have learned is to be more ruthless and having got that good start we need to kick on and actually do the job ourselves as opposed to leaving it for to somebody else to do, which is something we have been guilty of doing over the first three games.

In the four-day game we have been ruthless and we have been playing some really good cricket, which makes the way that we have performed in our opening Twenty20 matches all the more disappointing.

Twenty20 is a very short game and we could quite easily win our remaining matches, which we know is not beyond us so we have got to be thinking positively going into our next game.

If we can get onto a winning roll, we will keep with that habit because games come think and fast and before you have ended one game the next is only a few hours away. It’s a case of doing good things and remembering how you did those things because before you know it the game is on you and then it is over.

We know we just need to execute our plans a little bit better and try and squeeze teams that bit harder than we have been doing.

We get great support for our Twenty20 matches at Taunton so it has been disappointing that we have let them down in the way that we have.
Whether or not we will change the batting order around or not we will just have to wait and see but at the end of the day we just have to back ourselves and go out there and play with no fear which is what Justin Langer has been telling us to do.

The plan didn't come together

We were all very disappointed to lose our re-arranged Friends Provident quarter final match against Kent on Thursday last week. It was switched to Beckenham in the end because of the ground conditions at Canterbury after a deluge there the day before the game.

Despite the switch we still expected to go there, put up a good fight and win the game but it didn’t go according to plan. Kent played well and set a pretty good total on what was a good out ground wicket which proved to be too many for us as we spluttered along and lost wicket in quick succession which is what you cant afford to do.

The schedule of matches hasn’t been that kind to us what with being away at Tunbridge Wells and then at Whitgift School after which we had to sandwich the quarter final in before travelling back to Taunton late on Thursday evening.

The championship match against Yorkshire was very much an up and down sort of affair and went right down to the wire. We threw it away in the first innings and only took two batting points but we then got ourselves back into the game having bowled them out for 200 in their second innings.

The pressure told though and chasing 323 to win we lost four wicket wickets early on, and then looked like we were going to rescue it, but in the end we didn’t quite get home, which was disappointing.

The first division is going to be very keenly contested this year because there doesn’t seem to be a run away leader.

From our experiences so far there are certainly no easy games and every point could end up being vital when it gets to the end of the season.

Twenty20 cricket is a great concept, one that has really captured the imagination and attracted a new generation of spectators to the game.

When it was first introduced to the cricket calendar back in 2003 I think that its popularity took many people involved in the world of cricket by surprise. Since then however it has gone from strength to strength and it attracts capacity crowds wherever it is played.

Certainly everybody at Somerset seems to enjoy it and all the thrills and spills of the short form of the game have really caught on with our home fans at the County Ground and there is no better place to play.

There is nothing that we enjoy more than playing in front of a packed home crowd who cheer every run and wicket, so you can bet that all of the Somerset players will be going out to do their best to win all of our games and send our supporters home feeling happy!

We have got a lot of players in our squad who play expansive cricket and are ideally suited to the short form of the game so this season we will be looking to do better than we have over the last couple of years and win through to the latter stages of the competition.

Hopefully we will reach the finals that for the first time ever are being held at The Rose Bowl, which will be a spectacular venue for such an occasion.

Those of us who helped to win the Twenty20 Cup in 2005 will never forget that special day at the Brit Oval when we beat Leicestershire and then Lancashire in the final.

Twenty20 is such a fast and aggressive form of cricket that you have to be prepared to take risks and not be afraid of going for your shots, very much like Cameron White and Justin Langer did when they helped to set the record score of 250 for three against Gloucestershire back in 2006.

At the County Ground we always get big crowds who get right behind us so we will be looking for them to cheer us on and get our campaign off to a flying start by winning our first two home games against Northants on Wednesday and Warwickshire on Saturday.

It was pretty close ...

We gained our first win in the top division of the county championship when we beat Kent up at Tunbridge Wells, but it was a pretty close fought match throughout.

After winning the toss and deciding to bat first we did well to get to 208 all out - especially after we had slipped to 8o odd for six at one point and things certainly did not go according to plan.

Pete Trego played a vital innings to help us get to where we did. He is really in good form at the moment and getting wickets as well as scoring runs.

We knew after that we had to fight hard to get any kind of result out of that game and in the end we did pretty well.

We managed to dismiss them with only a 60 run lead thanks again to Pete Trego who took four wickets.

Then Marcus’s big hundred was the key innings for us. The way he batted at Kent typifies the way that he is playing at the minute, and although he isn’t enjoying the best of form in white ball cricket certainly in the red ball game he is playing superbly.

Steffan Jones bowled fantastically well in the Kent second innings and with five down over night we knew that we had to get couple of wickets early on which he did for us. He bowled a great spell and got four wickets in 10 balls to set us on our way.

Even though we have been playing good cricket in the four-day competition we had not won a game so to get the Kent result under our belts was a big sense of relief for us all.

We knew a win had to come, but because we are now in the first division we know that they are not going to come as easily as they did last season.

It was a shame that the rain ruined our chances of playing against Gloucestershire in the Friends Provident Trophy at Bath on Monday because we were looking to try to get our own back on them for beating us up at Bristol.

However by the time that this is printed we will know whether or not we are through to the last eight of the competition and who we will be playing against, so lets hope we can get the result we want at Cardiff on Wednesday and take the next step on the road to Lord’s.

We are playing some good cricket in the four day competition so have to feel pretty confident going up to Whitgift School to take on Surrey on Friday.

If we can try to get more first innings batting points than we have up until now it will stand us in better stead for the second time round and help us to set up a winning position.

The teams in the first division of the championship are stronger than some of the ones that we played against last season in the second division and the ones that we have come up against so far have all had quality bowling attacks. We are all up for the fight and this season is a great opportunity for us to prove just what we can do against the best players in England.

Bouncebackability

Our win against Worcestershire in the Friends Provident Trophy was a fantastic result for us, and one that we very much needed to bounce back from our two previous defeats in this competition.

I thought the guys responded really well and the energy levels from everybody out there on the field were just fantastic.

We had a bit of a setback early on but then a good partnership between Justin Langer and myself set up a good total for us to bowl at.

Justin batted superbly well so I knew that I had to stay out there and get some runs at the other end. In the end the partnership that we shared turned out to be a vital contribution to us winning the match.

Now we have another big match in the Friends Provident when we take on our old rivals Gloucestershire at Bath on Bank Holiday Monday and after they beat us at Bristol in the competition we will be even more determined to get our own back

It was very frustrating not to have beaten Sussex in our county championship match last week because we feel that we outplayed the reigning champions for the whole time in just about all departments of the game.

The Sussex match wasn’t like the game against Hampshire where we had one poor session that cost us most of our bonus points.

It was a very flat wicket and one where it was difficult to get anything for the bowlers, which I think we are trying to look at but at the end of the day we have just got to run in and give 100%, which is what all the boys did in the Sussex game so it is very frustrating that we only got 12 points.

However we did full batting and bowling points for the first time this season. Last year we did this very well and we know that put sides under pressure you have to score big runs in the first innings which is something we managed to do successfully against Sussex.

Sides do feel under pressure when you out 550 runs on the board, which is something we want to keep going and take into the next game against Kent at Tunbridge Wells.

It was great to see Ben Phillips contribute so much with both the bat and ball in the game, especially after he had such a frustrating time last season. His confidence is growing and we are all delighted for him.

Our game at Tunbridge Wells this week is an important one for us because at the moment although we haven’t been beaten yet we are at the bottom of the table, which isn’t a true reflection of how we are playing at the moment.

We have so far played against two very good sides, Lancashire and Sussex, and one not so strong, but we think that Kent are a side that we can beat so we will be going there playing the positive cricket that we have been for the last couple of weeks.

We have got to keep it tight and not get frustrated and if we carry on doing the things that we did in the Sussex game then we will get a result sooner or later. It is just a case of keep on building on the blocks that we have laid and we will get the results we want in the end.
I have never played at Tunbridge Wells before, although I have played against Kent at both Canterbury and Maidstone, but I understand it is a nice little ground so I looking forward to it and hope that we can get a win from our visit.

A topsy-turvy time

The championship match against Hampshire turned out to be a bit of a topsy-turvy encounter which was obviously affected by us losing the toss on what was a pretty green looking and wet wicket.

We got bundled out cheaply and they had a lot of momentum taking wickets. It was hard for us to stem the flow and we folded but then fought our way back into the match.

I think we did well to bowl them out for 359, after which we knew we had to bat for a day and a half which we did. Marcus Trescothick and Justin Langer managed a fantastic partnership and both of them scoring over 150 was a big bonus for us.

Zander de Bruyn just missed out on getting his hundred, which was really good for him on his championship debut for the county and Pete Trego also got runs at the end to set up a big total for us to hopefully bowl Hampshire out.

A draw wasn’t the result we were looking for, but we are still unbeaten in the first division of the county championship.

We were all very disappointed by the result from the game against Gloucestershire in Bristol. All the boys feel that we should have beaten both Glamorgan and Gloucestershire to have been at the top of the table, so to let the advantage slip is not what we wanted.

We need to win if we are going to progress and get through to the Lord’s final, so all the lads are kicking themselves.

Sussex are our opponents for this round of championship matches which is great because we have always wanted to play first division cricket and take on the best.

Over the past few years they have proven themselves to be the best so it should be a good game that we will be going out to win to boost our points.

We are coming into a bit of form from the second half of the Hampshire game so we will be looking to keep that going. However we all know that there are no easy games this year so they will present us with quite a challenge.

I look forward to playing against good teams and good bowling attacks because if you get runs against them then you know that you are doing pretty well.

This Sunday’s Friends Provident Trophy game against Worcestershire is massive and could prove to be pivotal in the competition because realistically we have to beat them here and Glamorgan away. We will then hopefully try to get something from the Gloucestershire game at Bath to get through to the last eight.

We are not out of the competition but it looks like Gloucester are the ones to catch so we have got to make sure we get the results against the other two.

Lord's is where we all want to be

It was disappointing for us to lose out to Glamorgan in the Friends Provident Trophy on Sunday, especially after getting off to such a good start in the competition.

This is the only one day competition which is played to the same format as One Day International matches and it is also the only competition which has got a Lord’s final - a place where all cricketers want to play if they can.

I have got some very fond memories of us lifting the Cheltenham and Gloucester Trophy at Lord’s back in 2001 and along with the rest of the Somerset team we are very keen to repeat that experience this season.

After being unable to get the game up at Worcester completed the previous weekend, to go down to The Rose Bowl and beat a big side like Hampshire was very pleasing. It was a good all round team effort with James Hildreth who made an unbeaten 112 for us batting absolutely magnificently.

Hampshire were boosted by having Kevin Pietersen in their side so to notch up the double over them tasted even sweeter.

Zander de Bruyn played beautifully on his Somerset debut and his innings of 79 was very much in the Keith Parson mould, very controlled and showed what an experienced player he is. He looks like a great addition to the side for 2008.

We then came back to Taunton on Sunday where we threw the match away. Glamorgan did have a good attack which included Jason Gillespie and Jamie Dalrymple but we let it slip badly to lose out when we were only chasing 220 odd to win.

If we had beaten Glamorgan on Sunday we would have seven points from our four games, Now we know that we need to try to win as many of the remaining matches to be certain of qualifying for the last eight of the Friends Provident, the first of which is up at Bristol on Sunday against Gloucestershire, which is always a tough place to play.

Alfonso Thomas looks to be another quality addition to the squad and bowled the ball in good areas on Sunday. He may not be too tall but he certainly gets the ball to skid through and will be a very useful player for Somerset.

We are currently playing our first Division One LV County Championship match at the County Ground this season against Hampshire.

This is another huge match for us and after our good showing up at Lancashire we will be looking to do even better against Hampshire even though they have got some quality players and are likely to have England player Pietersen in their team.

It felt like a Test match!

We certainly had a tough opening match on our return to top division championship cricket up at Old Trafford, where we had to fight all the way against Lancashire, who really are a quality outfit.

With the number of international players involved and the atmosphere out on the field, it felt like we were playing in a Test match!

I know we would all have wanted to win our first game back at the top. But with the state of the weather and the conditions we had to bat in, I think we all left feeling satisfied that we had fought all the way and taken the same amount of points as they had from the match.

I have been pretty pleased with my opening form with the bat this season. After having a disappointing time batting-wise last year, by my standards, I felt I had something to prove. So to get 86 against Hampshire in the Friends Provident and follow that up with two half centuries against an international bowling attack was exactly what I needed to do.

I was keen to start well and, with the pressure on places, I know I have to keep it going if I want to hold on to my place in the team.

The weather did us no favours in Sunday’s one-day game at Worcester and, having virtually got them all out for 150, I would certainly have backed us to have won the game and taken two more points. As it is, now we have three from our two games.

We have got two Friends Provident matches coming up in the space of three days this weekend. The first one is going to be a tough one, taking on Hampshire down at The Rose Bowl and, after beating them here at Taunton, they will be looking to get their revenge on Friday afternoon.

However we will be just as keen to take the two points from the game to boost our chances of going through to the quarter-final stages of this competition.

On Sunday we take on Glamorgan back here at Taunton and, after our last performance at home, we will be hoping that a good crowd comes along to cheer us on to hopefully another home win.

The arrival of Zander De Bruyn has put us all under even more pressure to perform well whenever we go out onto the pitch. He is a top-class all-rounder so we all know we have to do well to keep our places in the team.

The selectors have got a real headache at the club now and I think that they were very brave to retain the same 11 players who won the previous game for the match at Worcester on Sunday. Nobody has the divine right to a place in the team so it is fiercely competitive for places at the club this year.

Next week we play our first championship match of the season when we take on Hampshire on Wednesday. They are a good side and will be tough opponents for us but we will be playing hard to try to chalk up our first win in the red ball competition.

It's good to be back

It is really good to have the new cricket season underway at last, and even better that Somerset have had such an excellent start to the 2008 summer.

After a winter of hard training it was good to go out to Abu Dhabi in March to take part in the Pro-Arch Trophy where won three out of our four matches, but almost as important as that was the chance to get outside and practice on grass again.

We also had a good pre-season back at home where we were successful in all of our matches, including our opening first class game against Cambridge University up at Fenners, where despite it being freezing cold we recorded a resounding victory by 281 runs with a day to spare.

With so many players on the staff now at the County Ground everybody is fighting for places and every opportunity has to count so I knew that I needed to get some good runs to my name to stake a claim for a place in the opening game - which I managed to do up at Cambridge where I made 109 in the first innings at just under a run a ball which I was pretty happy with.

It was nice to get back to play cricket at Taunton on a decent wicket on Sunday and even better to beat Hampshire.

I was very happy with the way that I struck the ball and to be out there to bring the match home was exactly what I was aiming to do when I walked out to the middle.

A win to start us off in the Friends Provident competition is exactly what we wanted and we will be looking for a repeat performance when we take on Worcestershire up at New Road on Sunday.

One of the good things about the way that we played on Sunday was that, even though we found ourselves 91-4 chasing 221 with 21 overs to go, we didn’t panic.

We stuck to our guns and paced the reply exactly right, which is an aspect of the game that we have been working on because in times gone by we would have thrown that game away and been 30 runs short.

This just shows how much we have matured as a team and also what we can achieve if we work together - see out the good deliveries and punish the bad ones.

I was particularly pleased for John Francis, who has been out of the game for sometime but also for myself because in the past I might have hit the ball down long on’s throat instead of bringing the game home like I did on Sunday.

It is great news for Somerset that James Hildreth has signed a three-year extension to his contract that will keep him at the club until the end of the 2011 season. He is a hugely talented and exciting batsman and will form the nucleus of the team for many years to come.

We are back in Division One in the county championship for the first time since we were relegated at the end of the 2002 season. There will not be any easy games this season, with teams like Sussex, Lancashire and Surrey all in there with us and that is why we have bolstered the squad in the way that we have.
We know that our opener against Lancashire at Old Trafford will be tough because they have got some high-class players, but we have always performed against good teams so it is a chance for us to raise our own game and get stuck in and show what we are all about this season.