Former Kent captain Rob Key is looking to the future now and is focusing on scoring more runs come next season.

The 36 year old has one more year left on his contract at Canterbury and there’s always speculation that he will pack up playing to take up more work with Sky, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.

With a renewed passion for the game having stepped down from the captaincy earlier in the season, Key has been back to his best in the last couple of months, edging closer to 20,000 first class runs having come back into the side after a break.

Back in a more familiar role of opening the batting in the final few weeks of the season, Key was averaging over 70 and back to the form that saw him picked for England over ten years ago now.

Without the pressure of captaincy playing on his mind, Key believes he has been able to contribute more to the side and won’t be going back to being skipper again, whilst praising replacement Sam Northeast:

“I didn’t have any plans to take it back on the last time I gave it up. I can’t see for my own sanity me taking it on again.”

“I think he is a good captain and I think he will get better. He played well this year. It’s quite handy really, he was in good form when he got it. He’s got a good cricket brain and that helps a hell of a lot.”

“Twenty 20, things happen pretty quickly and you need to have a fast brain to make decisions quickly and he seems to have that. I think he has a good read on people and where the club needs to go.”

“I am always there to help and Sam and I have got a pretty good relationship, so even though I won’t be club captain, I’ll always be there if he needs me.”

“I don’t miss it, when you have done it for as long as I did, it’s an honour, but it can be a chore at times.”

“This second time around, I think I have served my purpose and got the club to where it needed to get to. It wasn’t in a great place when I took it on and hopefully we’re going in the right direction again now, so it’s now a good time to hand it on.”

Having stood down from the role initially at the end of the 2012 season, citing the reasons of not being able to spend enough quality time with his family, Rob believes he has made the right decision again for him, his wife and kids:

“It’s not just at home, but my own form that has been affected by the captaincy. When I look back at my own form as a player it’s probably about twenty runs difference almost.”

“I think the first game I came back after I’d stood down for a bit, I got about ninety odd against Surrey and knew that I wasn’t going back after that.”

“At the start of the year we sat down and tried to work out ways to get the batting firing and for myself as well.”

“After a couple of poor innings batting at three, we decided I would go back to opening and from then on it went alright for me.”

“Even when you are scoring runs, you know whether you are doing it in a fun way or it’s just a grind and not particularly great to watch. By the end, I felt like I was playing better than I had done for a long time.”

“The problem I have is my body probably isn’t as robust as it used to be, but I enjoyed the last couple of months of the season and it’s disappointing and frustrating as it showed not only what I could do, but what we could do as a side.”

With a year left on his current contract, Key isn’t looking too far into the future, but has moved to dispel any rumours that he will quit in the winter to take up more commentary work:

“I suppose, body willing, you are paid to do a job and if I continue to play like that and the body keeps going, you’d like to think you can play for as long as possible.”

“Who knows at this point in time and who knows what the future will hold.”

“I just want to score runs, get past 20,000 runs and get as many hundreds as possible. I don’t really set any goals.”

Looking back at the season, Key believes there are plenty of positives to take for a Kent side that’s still relatively inexperienced:

“Obviously we would have liked to have gone through and won a One Day competition, plue we would have liked to have done a hell of a lot better in the Championship and we were poor in that.”

“When you sit here now, we have got the makings of a very good side for a while to come. We’ve got Joe Denly back, Matt Coles back and having taken a hundred wickets, plus nearly all of the younger guys have signed up like Billings and Bell-Drummond.”

“I think although we haven’t won any silverware, it’s the start of something that could be quite special in the future.”

One player that won’t be back next season is Ben Harmison and the former captain had nothing but praise for the former Durham man:

“It’s very sad to see Harmy go as I thought he made some really good contributions at Kent over the time that he was here.”

“It was very unfortunate that he couldn’t bowl with his knee injury. Last year in One Day cricket he was a really handy player to have and he put in some match winning performances.”

“The Quarter Final against Gloucestershire showed that the most and not being able to bowl this year killed him really.”

One thing Kent haven’t had this past season was an overseas signing with some fans questioning whether it was a benefit or hindrance and Key believes the club will have to look at it seriously over the winter:

“I think we benefited from not having had an overseas this year. Who knows though, it might have been the icing on the cake and hopefully we will next year.”

“People get impatient with not winning trophies, but if you look to how well we have done in One Day cricket this year and how we have got on over the past couple of years as a Twenty 20 side, we’re probably one of the better sides in the country.”

“That was done with one of the youngest sides in the country, so the future’s pretty bright.”

“If we can be smart and finances allow, get someone in at the right time or the right person, it’s got to put us in a good position going forward.”

“For me, it’s been a very optimistic year because I look at other counties and think they might have had their one year or whatever it is, where as Kent, if it all stays the way it’s going at the minute, you could have some success that could last which is what we are all trying for.”

Check out Kent Sports News in the coming days for the second part of our exclusive with Rob Key and interviews with Joe Denly, Daniel Bell-Drummond and Jimmy Adams.