Fired up and ready to go!

Off-spinner and acting captain, Shaun Udal, begins his weekly column reflecting on life at the heart of Hampshire cricket

SO, here we go again, pre-season number nineteen for yours truly and I can honestly say I'm looking forward to this season as much as any of the previous eighteen. The squad has been strengthened with quality signings and all bodes well for an exciting season.

Those of you who have read Will Kendall's articles over the past few years will be used to perfect grammar and long words. Well, can I apologise now for my inability to repeat that? Will went to Oxford University, while I went to the Cove 'college of knowledge'... but I'll try to do my best!

We reported back this year a little earlier than last, March 21st in fact, and got straight down to the business in hand of nets. All the guys were in good nick and it was good to meet our new arrivals, messrs Pietersen, Logan, and McLean. Sean Irvine is still to arrive because Western Australia wouldn't release him early from his contract despite the fact that their matches finished three weeks ago!

Shane Warne and Simon Katich fly in this weekend, and we look forward immensely to them being here. A point that shouldn't be forgotten about these two is that they are the only two Aussies playing county cricket before the Ashes series. That speaks volumes for their love of Hampshire Cricket.

The club looked after numerous younger players this winter and sent them off to Perth under the watchful eye of Paul Terry and Giles White. At one stage there were as many as 12 Hampshire players in Perth training daily, with bowling sessions run by Bruce Reid, batting by Paul Terry and fitness work by a trainer who by all accounts was a nightmare. I'm glad I stayed in England!

Nic Pothas went back to South Africa, which left myself, John Crawley, Billy Taylor and Alan Mullally to endure the cold of Hampshire. Alan has been granted a well deserved benefit year in 2005 for 17 seasons hard toil as a quick(ish) bowler and fully deserves every penny that comes his way. Please support him when you can.

The over-riding feeling on March 21st was one of excitement. The guys are fitter than ever before - our annual fitness tests with the Army at Sandhurst were a massive improvement on last year when the average score on the yo-yo running test was level 18. This year it was level 21 and even this ageing off-spinner attained respectability!

Realism needed about winning trophies

The excitement and anticipation is obviously going to have to be tempered with a touch of realism. People are already mentioning us winning something - I do recall the same things being said when Shane signed for us in 2000 and we were relegated!

We are a much stronger unit this time around and silverware is achieveable. But we need to look at the smaller picture of winning every game which, if we do, will get us to our target of breaking the 12-year gap of lifting a trophy.

Undoubtedly we will lose Kevin Pietersen for the majority of the summer and Shane and Simon when the Ashes series begins, so it's imperative we win as many games as possible while they're available. Kevin has settled in well and has been a pleasure to have about the place, passing on a few of his ideas about batting to the guys and joining in with high energy levels in all he does.

He sat out this week's one-day friendlies at Chelmsford and Canterbury, which were very disappointing from our point of view. Essex put us in on a damp track and we struggled to reach 139 all out against Alex Tudor, who took 4 for 5 from six overs, and Darren Gough. I managed to put together 65 and we batted on to reach 198 for the loss of 14 wickets in our 50 overs. To complete a 'bad day at the office' both Ronnie Irani and Grant Flower scored big hundreds as they rattled up 357 for 1 in 50 overs against our young attack.

Our top order failed again on Tuesday against Kent and we managed only 137 all out after again being put in. I top scored with just 29 and James Bruce hit out at the end for 24. But they reached the modest target in just 20 overs with Robert Key (70) and Geraint Jones seeing them home without loss.

The postponement of Wednesday's friendly against Gloucestershire at the Rose Bowl was a pity as it would have given us a chance to find some form. In the absence of our overseas boys and Dimi Mascarenhas some of the younger players would have had another chance to impress. We're hoping that today's (Friday 8th) game at Northampton will take place to enable that to happen.

Shane has been on the phone constantly lately asking me, as captain in his abscence, to make sure we play pre-season as if they were Championship matches. His attitude is simple in everything he does - he wants us to win!

So we make the 'real' start next Wednesday when Gloucestershire visit the Rose Bowl in the Frizzell County Championship.

This season we have a genuine chance of firmly putting Hampshire back on the cricketing map. We've prepared well and have left nothing to chance. It's now down to us, the players, to do something special and we aim not to let anyone down.

One thing is for sure: the Rose Bowl will be an exciting place to watch cricket this summer.