I BELIEVE that our Championship match against Durham at the Riverside, starting today, will provide this group of players with our biggest challenge yet.

Certainly, since I’ve been involved in the first-team set-up during the last few years, this will be the weakest that we’ve looked on paper.

We’ve got a number of injuries in the seam bowling department and then a handful of other lads away on England one-day duty for their series against Sri Lanka. So, there’s no doubt that it will be a test of character for the team.

Durham are a good side. They’ve started the season well. But I’m very confident that we still have enough quality and we’ll be going in with the mentality to win the game.

The Worcester game at the start of last year, the Notts game immediately after that, we still had seven players missing and got a win and a draw.

If Durham take us lightly, we can definitely sneak up on them.

This week would be the perfect time for the top order batting to get the job done after our inconsistencies across the first six Championship games.

Then, the bowlers who do come in need to be accountable. They may be inexperienced but they are all capable of taking the wickets we need. We must also back them up in the field.

A win, which would be our third in the Championship this season, would definitely kick us on and give us massive belief.

But we’ll have to take it one day at a time and see where we are at. If we do that, I’m sure we’ll be somewhere near to getting a result.

Personally, it was nice to get on the board as limited overs captain with back-to-back wins against Northants and Lancashire in the Royal London last week.

I’ve said before that I believe in this squad of players. The first four games across both the one-day competitions were frustrating but those wins were just what we needed.

Hopefully, they can play a part in building confidence for the Championship as well.

Adam Lyth was magnificent in scoring back-to-back one-day centuries.

'Lythy' is extremely talented and we’ve been saying that for a long time here. He’s perhaps not been backing himself as much as he should in white ball. He showed us what he can do if he backs himself and has that license.

We thought his innings against Northants at Scarborough was a one-off. That’s not taking anything away from the innings. But to back it up shows he can do it consistently.

Hopefully, now his one-day form can be as good as his red ball stuff has been over the last couple of years.

After winning the toss against Lancashire, Jason Gillespie came up to me and asked if I had been using a double-sided coin.

I always call heads and I’d won eight tosses in a row up until then – although it didn’t do us much good in the first few games!

I believe our chairman Steve Denison reckons I should get down to the casino. You can guess what would happen if I did that.

* HERE’S hoping Jonny Bairstow can transfer his Test match form into the one-day arena having been recalled to England’s ODI squad.

When you’re playing like he is at the moment – he’s in a purple patch – you just want to be playing as much cricket as you can, no matter what the format is. He should have no issues transferring over to the white ball stuff.

International teams can’t bowl at him at the minute, and when you’ve got extra fielders up in the ring, more people to hit it over, he can take the game away from you.

He hits the ball so cleanly and my belief is that he should be in and around all of England’s teams at the minute, including the Twenty20.

* Alex and his sponsors Pennine Business Partners are aiming to Hit Cancer for Six in 2016. They are donating £10 to the Laura Crane Youth Cancer Trust every time Alex hits a six or takes a catch and are asking cricket lovers everywhere to support this great cause that provides special care and support to young people fighting cancer. Visit Pennine Business Partners page on Just Giving https://www.justgiving.com/Pennine-Business-Partners