Can we go back to playing T20, please?

I never thought that I would say this, but I would much prefer us to be playing T20 than the County Championship at the moment, after another very poor day for us.

Despite half centuries from Rory Burns and Steve Davies, we were knocked over for just 198 and then failed to pick up a wicket with Notts closing day one on 50-0.

With the sun beating down and without a cloud in the sky, Gareth Batty had no hesitation in batting first when he won the flip of the coin. Team news was that Rory Burns was fit enough to play, which meant that, alongside Tim Linley, Dominic Sibley missed out.

Burns started positively as he worked Harry Gurney for 4 in the first over, but lost his opening partner when Arun Harinath edged to Samit Patel at slip. Burns continued to play an array of stunning shots, especially straight down the ground, but the other batsmen weren't as comfortable as the Banstead 'keeper, as Vikram Solanki fell to an in-swinging Andre Adams delivery for 7.

That wicket brought Ricky Ponting to the crease on his final first class game, and he and Burns had a rebuilding job to do. Burns moved to another Championship half century with a flick off Gurney, but in yet again the last over of a session we lost a wicket, when Burns could only tickle a leg side ball to Read behind the stumps. A disappointing way to end a very good 57 from Burns, and Notts were very happy with us going to lunch 3 down for 93.

And they would have been cock-a-hoop when Ponting edged onto his pad and into the hands of short leg on 29 just after the break. Zander De Bruyn managed to work his way to 16 until he flashed at Shahzad and was caught behind, leaving Steven Davies and Zafar Ansari with a big job on their hands. Davies played in his typically fluent manner, but Ansari struggled to tick the score along and in the penultimate over before tea (!) he firmly pushed Graeme White to Rikki Wessels at short leg and he held on at the second attempt. 175-6 read a very poor picture after choosing to bat.

It didn't get much better after tea as the last 4 wickets fell for just 23 runs, with the last 4 batsmen all registering ducks. Davies was the only one to put up a fight, as he was stranded on a very well made 65. 18 fruitless overs were to follow, where Wessels and Steven Mullaney made batting look far easier than we did, as the closed less than 150 behind with all their first innings wickets still intact. 

So after the joys of the last week or so in the T20, any thoughts of transferring that form and confidence into the Championship seem to have been distinguished. It often happens after some T20's that a side gets rolled over easily when they return to 4 day cricket, but the way the batsmen performed today, they can have no excuses.

Burns and Davies were the only two who seemed to adjust to the apparent very good conditions to bat in, with the others getting out to some rather poor shots or some very good bowling and fielding from Notts. Burns' wicket was key as he was looking better than ever today, but the others need to take a look at themselves.

We won an important toss but failed to capitalise, and if we can't find some wickets in the morning session tomorrow, we could be in for a very long couple of days indeed.