Matt Walker has said he is pleased with the “Kent feel” at The Spitfire Ground, St Lawrence, following his return to the club as assistant coach.

Walker recently returned to Kent – coming back to the county where he spent the majority of his 19-year playing career – having ended his time as a player and then begun his time as a coach at Essex.

Walker was speaking to KSN at Chaucer Direct on Friday evening, where, along with spin bowler Adam Riley and a host of other Kent sporting stars, they were supporting the team of volunteers manning the phones to take donations for Sport Relief.

“It’s great to be back”, said Walker, discussing his return to his home county. “It’s home – it’s where I played and loved playing, obviously for 17 years as a player and before that going through the system.

“I’m very proud to have played for Kent and very privileged to be part of that growing up as a player and now I’ve got the chance to do the same as a coach.”

The players began their outdoors training last week, and 41-year-old Walker was very happy with how it had gone so far.

“Weather-wise, we’ve been very lucky, and the groundstaff have been unbelievable with the weather we’ve had over the last five or six months – to get the surfaces ready is nothing short of miraculous, actually!

“The practice has been really good, really intense and worthwhile and everyone has really come back ambitious and excited, like you’d expect.

“It’s great to see and it’s setting us up, hopefully, for a really good season.”

The team’s dreaded fitness testing and “yo-yo” testing took place Friday before last [March 14], and though Walker admitted it was “not the most popular day of the season”, he was pleased with what he had seen.

“They all put in and they all put some really good scores on the board”, he said.

With a number of new members of staff in-place, Walker pressed on the importance of having a Kent spine behind the scenes.

“It’s a slightly new [backroom] team, and I think what’s nice about it is it’s a real Kent team”, he said.

“I think with myself, Rob obviously as captain is a Kent boy, and you’ve got Ealy [Mark Ealham] as a part-time bowling coach. Min Patel comes and does work with the spinners and will help out wherever he can in various areas. Simon Willis – Academy Director and Second Team Coach has been there for years and is a Kent guy.

“There’s that real “Kent feel” to it as well – I think that’s really important if you can achieve that in a management setup – people who know what it means to play for Kent – how proud they are to represent the county, so you enthuse that into the players. That’s what’s really important.

“We’ve got two new guys – the new strength & conditioning coach [Jon Fortescue] who’s come from a football background – from Wolves – so new, fresh ideas, which is really good. There’s the new analyst [Michael Najdan] who’s been brilliant and given us great information, and a new physio [Dan George] – who’s been around, but he’s now taken over from Nimmo [Reid] who’s moved upstairs, if you like.

“There’s a real freshness to it, which is really good and it’s been a really good first week.”