Kent head to “The Home of Cricket” this week with coach Matt Walker relatively happy with the first three games of the season but knowing that with a week off for his side next week, four days in St John’s Wood this week could be crucial come the end of the Championship season.

Reflecting on last weekend’s weather spoiled draw with Essex at the Spitfire Ground, Walker told us, “We didn’t quite get it right with the ball and had to scrap hard – we showed some resilience with the bat which was really pleasing.”

“It’s something that we identified pre-season when we are facing a decent first innings score when we bowl first and how we respond to that. Against Warwickshire we didn’t and fell away quite dramatically so that made last week a good test for us.”

“Facing 450 on the board, we had to match that – it was the target! With the weather around and where it was sat when we batted, we weren’t going to win the game but what we wanted to do was to get four hundred and some batting points and show fight and response.”

“And we did led brilliantly by Zak (Crawley) and his 170 was brilliant. The start that he and Ben (Compton) gave us was almost perfect – a hundred odd for no wicket was exactly what was required in those situations.”

“It takes the steam out of it a bit and their early pressure and gives us the platform to get four hundred which the weather robbed us!”

“With both their innings and Zak’s was world class along with Joey Evison there was some really good signs. Of course, we’d have liked to build on the start through the middle order, but people are spending time in the middle and getting used to it more and are looking better every time they walk out to bat.”

“It’s not been a terrible start,” Walker reflected. “The win over Northants was important coming in the first game as it gave us some points on the board and took a bit of pressure off in giving people some confidence.”

“We underperformed at Edgbaston against a good side and were outplayed during that game – we took our medicine and then last week, we improved in some ways.”

“To sit where we are after three games isn’t too bad at all, but we know that we haven’t played our best game yet and put it all together yet properly, but the signs are encouraging as people are spending more time in the middle and are getting more comfortable.”

“The big performance isn’t far away – we’ll take where we are at the moment and if we can end this four-game sequence, won two, lost one, we’d certainly take it and I think that makes this week a big week really in some ways.”

“Middlesex had an exciting win at the weekend which will buoy them, but until that point, they’d lost a couple, but it’s a game that we will look to go and win, taking it to them and hopefully we can put the whole package together!”

“Every game you look to win, but they’ve made a slow start – we match them in most departments, and I’d like to think that if we play our best game, we’ll give them a really good game.”

“But I’m sure they’ll be saying the same thing about us – they will be better off for their win last time and they have got some very good players across the board.”

“We’re not going in thinking that they will just roll over and die, far from it – they’ll be hungry for another win. But we’ve just got to concentrate on doing the basics really well – keep it simple and hopefully we can put a package together from start to finish to win a game of cricket.”

“It’s always great to go to Lord’s as you don’t need a team talk playing at Lord’s because you’ve got your own inspiration right in front of you.”

“I know that some lads haven’t played Championship cricket there before so hopefully they’ll be inspired to do something special!”

Walker then confirmed that Nathan Gilchrist will be playing for the second team this week as he needs some overs under his belt. Matt Quinn and Michael Hogan will both return to the squad with Grant Stewart being back in the equation.

Hamid Qadri remains in the twelve. “We’ve got a fit Hogan, a fit Quinn, a fit Stewart, and a fit Wes Agar for our bowling options along with Qadri and we’ll make the final decision on Thursday morning.”

“It’s nice to have them back and whatever we go in with it’ll give us the best opportunity to get the twenty wickets and set up a game that we can win,” Walker confirmed…

Picture supplied by Max Flego Photography.