From bigstarcricket.com Diary
I will play what will almost certainly be my last Test in England on Friday at Trent Bridge and I am very determined to go out with a win and square the series.
Sri Lanka are not due to tour England for a Test series again until 2011 so although you never say never I think it’s safe to say this will be my last Test match on English soil.
I set myself high standards before the tour as I wanted to do well in England. So, from a personal point of view, those ten wickets I took at Edgbaston were very satisfying, but ultimately it was a wasted effort.
Maybe that sounds a little harsh on myself as a ten wicket haul in Test matches is obviously tough work and something we have to work hard to achieve but I would prefer to enjoy more team success than just personal glory.
I am very determined to win at Nottingham and go out in England on a high. I would love to draw the series now from the position we find ourselves in. We have an important one-day series afterwards but this is the big one for me.
Although we have a young team, we have seen both at Lord’s and at Edgbaston that these youngsters are capable of putting in some great performances. We just have to make sure that we all perform together as a team rather than as individuals.
In both Tests we let ourselves down in the first innings and then battled back in the second innings. It would be nice if we could give ourselves a chance to get into the game this time instead of keep chasing it.
This will be my first Test match at Nottingham and I have only played a single one-day international there, when we beat South Africa in a tri-nation tournament in 1998 so maybe that will be a good omen!
I also recall playing against Nottinghamshire for Kent in a four-day match at Trent Bridge in 2003. I only bowled one over in the first innings, which cost 16 runs, but in the second innings I took 6-36 and we ended up winning the match.
Playing then was a young Kevin Pietersen. He scored a hundred in the first innings (off 99 balls) and his brilliant 142 at Edgbaston showed that he has fulfilled that early promise. I regard that innings last week as one of the best I have ever seen. He played me as well as the likes of Brian Lara and Inzamam-ul-Haq.
It’s up to me to come back at him at Trent Bridge, but I wouldn’t say I am only concentrating on Pietersen. As soon as I start focusing only on Pietersen one of the other players might give us trouble. I will try to come up with a plan against him though I certainly won’t be giving him any special treatment. Let’s see what happens. © Copyright bigstarcricket.com |