LOCAL lad Matthew Fisher gives the latest from within the Yorkshire camp...

IT’S derby day this weekend for Sheriff Hutton Bridge, who start the Yorkshire Premier League North campaign at home against Woodhouse Grange. And it maybe that I get a game.

My recovery from the side injury I suffered playing for Yorkshire at Leicester a couple of weeks ago is coming along nicely, and I’m close to being able to play again as just a batsman.

That may come for Bridge on Saturday, although there’s a few things I need to tick off before I can say for certain. If not, I may play in Yorkshire’s second team next week.

I certainly will be playing for Bridge at some point over the next few weeks, and I can’t wait to play alongside my brothers and other mates down there. I know they are all really looking forward to starting the season well. Fingers crossed I can help.

It’s just nice getting up on Saturday morning and not having that massive pressure on your shoulders. Don’t get me wrong, I still desperately want to perform and do well for the lads, but there’s not the pressure of county cricket. Having said that, that enjoyment factor can bring out the best in you.

I’d probably bat at three or four for them, so I should get quite a bit of batting, which can only improve it for when I get back playing for Yorkshire.

I’ve been delighted with the way my recovery has progressed, starting with being back in the nets batting.

It’s looking good. It’s settled down really nicely, and I’ve had a lot of good days rather than bad ones. Usually you do have a few bad days with rehab, but every one has been good.

I’m hoping to be doing some bowling drills at the start of next week and be back bowling and have a good build-up to my first-team return in the next two or three weeks.

It will be really light into a mitt first of all. Then it will about about building my run-up up slowly. It will be drill work for maybe a week, then back up to my full run for maybe a week and then bowling full tilt for another week.

I’m looking at maybe three weeks from now to be back to playing as a bowler.

The Championship win over Nottinghamshire was a great effort from the lads. I was at the ground doing some 12th man duties for last couple of days and saw a bit of Friday’s first day. There were a number of impressive individual contributions.

Hoddy’s batting in the first innings, Lythy battled well on the first morning and lads chipped in down the lower order. We also bowled well. We went for a few more runs than we’d like. We like to dry it up, but there were plenty of wicket-taking balls.

Gary and Jack dug in on the second evening to set it up for the bowlers in the second innings.

We’re pretty happy. There’s always stuff to improve, but that will come.

It’s been a pretty tough start to the summer for one reason or another, not least because of injuries with myself and Patto and IPL with Dave and Liam.

For some counties, if you had that amount of bowling gone in the space of a week before your first game, it would really dent the mood. But the amount of hard work that’s been put in through the winter, it would be a waste to then be down in the dumps and feel sorry for ourselves.

Everyone is together and backing each other.

We have three tough away games now on tough pitches. So, if we can get out of that with a couple of wins and a draw or even a couple of draws and a win, I’m sure we’ll be very happy going into the one-dayers next month.

Since last week’s column, the ECB have announced their plans for 100-ball cricket to be introduced in 2020 for their city-based competition. And, honestly, I can’t give you a definitive view on whether I’m for or against it because there are so many things we don’t know.

As soon as I heard it, I thought ‘What a stupid idea’. But you chat to people about it and there are good points.

One thing is for sure, it’s going to be interesting to see how it all develops.

As a bowler, I’m keen to see where the 10-ball over fits in. If you’re good at that, you could be hot property in terms of getting picked up by teams.

It will be a tough skill to master because, after six balls in a T20 game, you feel it as a bowler because you put so much effort into each ball. After that, you may get tired and that’s where batsmen can capitalise. The flip side is that you get into a rhythm and might bowl it quite well.