Kent’s newly appointed vice-captain Sam Northeast is keen to let his batting do the talking in the 2014 season.

Northeast has been named as vice-captain under fellow opening batsman Rob Key, who has taken the captaincy back from James Tredwell. Tredwell gave the role up to focus on his international commitments, and yesterday was awarded an incremental contract by England.

Northeast had a slightly disappointing season with the bat in 2013, averaging just 26.00 in the County Championship, making six half-centuries but failing to convert a single score into three figures, whilst making one fifty in an all-round disappointing T20 campaign for Kent. One bright moment for the 24-year-old came in June, when he made his maiden List A century with a superb 115 in the world record-breaking chase of 337 to beat Sussex.

Having put in the hard yards in pre-season at The Spitfire Ground, St Lawrence, Northeast is ready and raring to go in all three forms of the game in the new campaign.

“Obviously it’s pretty key for me [to feature in all three forms of the game in 2014]”, he told KSN. “I’m not putting pressure on myself. I’ve done as much work as I can to try and improve and hopefully perform at the level I want to in all forms, so hopefully it will come off.

“I’ve got pretty positive thoughts at the moment, and hopefully we can sit down at the end of the year and say that I came on and my game’s one step further down the line. That’s the main thing come the end of the year – to see the improvement, really.”

The 2014 season will be Northeast’s first as vice-captain, and though he is proud to be in the role, he doesn’t expect it to change what he is doing all that much.

“I still don’t see a huge difference. Obviously I think that as the season might go on, my role might have to change, but at the moment it’s still Keysy’s [Rob Key’s] show and he’s still the guy who’s going to be taking what’s going on, and I can add bits and pieces here and there.

“Still, my number one aim is to perform myself. At the moment my role hasn’t really changed, but it might change during the season.”

Northeast and Key have enjoyed a good relationship in recent years, having been regular batting partners at the top of the order since the 2012 season.

“To be fair, in the season’s gone past, we’ve always talked about our cricket and everything like that. It’s not a new relationship – it’s the same as what’s gone on in the past without me being in that role, so now I’m in that formal role, it is what it is.

“I’ve always tried to get my views across to Keysy at some points anyway, when he’s been captain. I think our relationship when opening the batting will be the same and we’ll just continue on, which is a nice thing.”

 

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