ASIDE from our bowling, which I thought we did pretty well with on the whole, we were poor in our defeat against Middlesex at Lord's this week.

There were probably a few too many easy boundaries given away in their innings but in general the bowling and fielding effort was good.

Batting-wise, barring Gary Ballance, we haven't really been able to get it together all year in the County Championship. A few decisions didn't go our way but if you don't bat well as a unit, you're not going to win enough games.

It's obviously a frustrating period at the moment in that regard but I think everybody in the dressing room is too good not to turn it around in the next few games before we break for the T20 Blast. Then hopefully we can right a few wrongs in the second half of the season.

Next week against Surrey at Headingley won't be the easiest for batsmen with the pink ball under lights. It will be tough. But if we can get a score, personally and team-wise, it could kick-start our season.

We've got five home games left, including two at Scarborough early next month and in August, and if we can win three out of those, we can be there or thereabouts in the title shake-up.

The majority of us have had experience of the pink ball now, whether it be for Yorkshire, the MCC or Australia in Peter Handscomb's case. But it's going to be different in English conditions.

The twilight period has been the hardest for batting in the games that I've played in Abu Dhabi, both for Yorkshire and the MCC, including the latest one against Middlesex in pre-season.

In England, there might not be a twilight period as there is abroad, so it's going to be interesting to see how it reacts.

The ball used in this year's MCC game was the Dukes one we will be using next week and it was slightly better than the Kookaburra Yorkshire have used in the past. I got 41 in the first innings and you can bat against it. It's not as if you can't get runs.

People have had plenty of hundreds against it and hopefully we play well and bounce back from the Middlesex defeat. We've got the England lads back and are at full strength, so we're confident.

I reckon Shaun Marsh is almost the perfect replacement for Travis Head as our overseas signing for Twenty20.

When Trav was called up by Australia A and taken away from us, it was a disappointment because he's a brilliant player. We were all looking forward to him coming back after last year.

But Shaun is international quality and has played a lot of T20 competitions around the world, winning a few titles, which should help us. To get him in, it will be a great learning experience for everyone around.

I would imagine Shaun will also be wanting to prove a point to Australia, having not played for them in a while – certainly in white-ball cricket anyway. He was left out of their Champions Trophy squad recently.

Coming over here and getting some runs will put his name in the hat ahead of what will be a big winter for Australia. More importantly, we're hoping he does the business for us.

He has played a bit of international cricket but when he plays domestically, he always seems to perform well, including winning a few Big Bash titles with the Scorchers.

We're all looking forward to welcoming him into the dressing room when he arrives in Leeds this weekend.