'Banger' back in the nets at Taunton preparing for Durham

Marcus Trescothick was back batting at the County Ground at 9.30 this morning only a few hours after Somerset had been defeated by Gloucestershire in their opening championship match of the season.

Trescothick who failed to score in the first innings in Bristol and was dismissed for just ten runs after occupying the crease for thirty eight minutes in the second, is obviously determined to make amends for the Cidermen judging by the way he was treating the net bowlers.

The England star gets an early opportunity to set the record straight when he faces Durham in the four day match that starts at Taunton on Wednesday and following of from Mondays disappointing result knows that nothing short of a victory will do.

The county championship new boys finished bottom of Division Two last season with only a single win and eleven defeats from their campaign.

Somerset on the other hand were relegated from the top division at the end of last season, after having finished runner's up in 2001, and will feel confident of beating the north east county at Taunton.

The two sides have met in the west country on five occasions, Somerset winning three times, with the other two being drawn. The last time the pair met in August 2000 was rain affected and ended as a high scoring draw.

Somerset make two changes to the team that played against Gloucesterhire. Ian Blackwell is missing as a result of damaging the webbing between the fingers of his left hand taking a catch at Bristol, so Keith Dutch is brought into the twelve to give the attack some variety along with Keith Parsons who scored an impressive century for Somerset Seconds last week.

The Somerset twelve have been named as: Marcus Trescothick, Peter Bowler, Mike Burns, Jamie Cox, James Bryant, Rob Turner, Aaron Laraman, Keith Parsons, Keith Dutch, Richard Johnson, Nixon McLean and Simon Francis .

Chief executive was philosophical about the Cidermen's defeat when I spoke to him at the County Ground on Tuesday morning. The Somerset boss said: "Whilst it was a disappointment to lose our match at Bristol we take some satisfaction from the fact that it was a highly competitive match and a very good advert for county cricket."

He continued: "We now look forward to our first home match of the season and hope that our members will come out in force and support the team. The weather looks set fair and we are all keeping our fingers crossed that the new swipe card turnstile system will operate without a hitch. Miracles sometimes happen!"

One entrance that members will not be able to use for the match is the new Riverside Turnstile, that has been built on the riverside walk near to the Brewhouse Car Park, alongside the River Tone, to replace the old entrances at the back of the Colin Atkinson Pavilion and the Coal Orchard entrance.

Mr Anderson told me: "The new Riverside Entrance will not be in use, and people will have to access the ground either using either the Sir Vivian Richards gate on Priory Bridge Road, or the Jack White Gates in St James Street."

He continued: "We are extremely disappointed that the project was held up as a result of an objection by the Environment Agency who were apparently concerned that people queuing or leaving the ground might fall into the river."

He concluded: "This is the ultimate in nanny state gobbledegook because the ground has been in existence since 1875 and I am unaware of anybody falling into the river accidentally-although I'm not sure that in the past some of our members might have felt like jumping in!"