It must be the middle of summer – no, not the rain outside your window, its the return of Twenty20 cricket to England!

I really like the way they schedule this competition, creating a few weeks where nothing is played but twenty20 cricket. It helps get a bit of hype in the media, and it means there is plenty of cricket on the tele to watch after work! I havn’t actually been to a live Twenty20 game before (the perils of living in a ‘minor’ county), but this year should be different – and I reckon it’ll be a laugh!

There are plenty of changes happening within most of the counties, with overseas players being called back by their countries and new players coming in. The most intriguing of these is Essex’s signing of Adam Hollioake – the one day specialist who retired a couple of years ago. Lancashire have brought in Jayasuriya who could be explosive, and Somerset didn’t need to bring anyone in as they already had some massive players in Langer, Tresco and Cameron White. Somerset are the favourites to win because of these players, but you can’t count out a ‘lesser’ team such as the holders Leicestershire were considered last year. The fixtures can be seen on the ECB site, and as the competition goes on I’ll write a few of my thoughts!

News was released last week that cricinfo.com had been sold to ESPN, the American sports network in an effort to reach out to other areas of the sporting world. Now I’m not a daily visitor to the cricinfo site – I think there is too much statistical stuff, and that the latest news I want is never quite as easy to find as it should be. I did visit there today though and I was a bit taken back by the adverts on the site. I know they’ve always had adverts, but if I remember rightly they’ve never been quite so bold or in your face as they are now. Maybe this is a start of the ESPN influence, whos own site is not laden with adverts, but is very content heavy. I hope that cricinfo doesn’t go downhill as for a quick blast of statistics it really is the number one. I will keep a keen lookout in the coming months and hope the new buyers recognise that.

The Wisden Group, which owned the site has also recently sold the magazine “The Wisden Cricketer” to BSkyB, which means it looks like they are getting out of the publishing game, apart from the yearly bible, the “Wisden Almanac”. Last year they bought the technology behind Hawk Eye, and this deal means it now looks like they can put their time into developing and improving this. Hawk Eye is moving from cricket into other sports such as tennis, and developing this is undoubtedly a very smart move!

Well we’ve had pink grips take over the nation’s interest in the first half of the year (they still look stupid by the way), and now green, red and white grips will probably be the next thing to create a bit of interest amongst cricket grip enthusiasts (if such a thing exists!).

Collingwood, Bell and Prior, all Slazenger players have been using these in the latest test on their cricket bats, and as always nowadays there is a reason behind it. There is a charity called “Chance to Shine” who raise money and awareness to bring cricket to state schools and ensure that everyone who wants a chance to play cricket gets it. I don’t know anywhere just yet that you can get one of these grips if you so wish, but I’ll keep you informed in case you do want one!

They probably won’t get as much coverage as the pink grips did, as they were something so very different to anything before them, but if it helps awareness for something cricket based then any bit of coverage helps! If you havn’t seen what they look like, here is a photo from the BBC showing Collingwoods after he got a ton today. So what do you think, would you put one on your bat?

Despite a week of good weather before the test, when the next test came around it was time for more of that English weather, rain! Things don’t look for the next 10 days in Durham, let alone the four days this test match is supposed to be on. It could be a complete washout, so we’ll have to do something else with our weekends! Mind you, the weather hasn’t been that bad “down south” where I am, so I should get a game in tomorrow (not sure yet whether thats a good or bad thing!) Here’s a lovely image of what everyone will see for the next four days if they turn on sky sports!

photo © Getty Images

Arise Sir Monty of Panesar, for you have won us the third test match against West Indies on a tense fifth day in Manchester. The first ten wicket in a match haul for Monty, and the first by an English spinner in 10 years was the main impetus for England in a game that shouldn’t have been nearly as close as it was.

England fell apart with the bat a bit in the second innings which meant that the WIndies were set 455 to win, which although being a testing target was still reachable. And going into the final day I was more than a little pessimistic to be honest. Harmison also stepped up to the plate and took four wickets as well, but to be honest I’ve seen little of this test match due to my sky box not working! It’s all back working now so at least I’ll get to watch the highlights this evening!

We have one more test match in this series starting on Friday before the one-dayers start, and Matthew Hoggard returns to the squad after injury with Plunkett making way and missing the chance to play on his home ground in Durham.

It seems that to play county cricket nowadays age is not a problem! There have been youngsters up and down the country playing and used as substitue fielders, but at New Road today where Worcestershire knocked up a massive 701-6 declared, Surrey had a 53 year old playing for them!

The player in question was Alan Butcher, coach and also father of Surrey captain Mark. And he was only utilised as a 12th man, but I thought it was probably the oldest player to appear in a county cricket game for a while!

I’m quite surprised that Surrey didn’t have another squad member available, so if they’re short then they could just get in contact with me and offer a good pay packet I’ll do it!