So near but… Kent were within two wickets of starting their Bob Willis Trophy campaign against County Champions Essex with a win at Chelmsford.

It was a performance that both excited and frustrated coach Matt Walker who has been talking to KSN ahead of the weekends return to Canterbury to face Sussex.

Walker told us, “I think ultimately it was a game that we had in our hands; albeit for a very poor two hours we played some fantastic cricket. We’ve been there a couple of times last year where we controlled the game completely and then had a very average session or half a day whatever you want to call it and as we said right at the start of last season, you cant afford to have those sort of sessions.

“You can have an OK session or even lose a session, but to have a really poor session like we did at Chelmsford losing seven wickets in a session really killed us! From being in a position of being in command ninety runs ahead going into that third innings of the game, we were in control and its something that we’ve done a few times now.

“We talked through the reasons after the game – its probably a mind-set thing but we need to be a bit more positive rather than hold onto what we’ve got. Its frustrating because we did play some very good cricket and we almost still managed to win the game.

“We want to win – we want to be as competitive as we can every time we play in every competition. We can take a lot of positives but in the end it’s a game that we should have won against the reigning County Champions! Albeit it was the first game of the season, its another one that we let slip by.”

“When you drive home after the end of the game you know how you feel in the pit of your stomach. I know I woke up the following morning feeling frustrated and I do feel like we lost an opportunity but driving home after the game, whilst I was very disappointed, I still had a feeling of pride and in a strange way satisfaction because for three and a half days, we out played Essex – you can look at the game as a whole and paper it will say that we lost and they took the points home and all we got was some bonus points.

“But that’s not how I operate and not how we look at things here. Of course we’re judged on results and that’s the way it works and quite rightly so – I think that when you look at the journey that we’re on and you look at the process and you look at the performance and you look at the attitude, I couldn’t have asked for more,” the Kent coach admitted before adding “except of course a better third innings of the game!”

“We showed great character; we showed great skill with the ball – for the first game of the season I thought we bowled for as long as I’ve seen for a little while. It was excellent for everyone and if you go down that line-up and compare ourselves with Essex – Simon Harmer against our two youngsters and Alastair Cook against our young Jordan Cox at the top of the order; Matt Milne’s still in his infancy really in first class cricket – we are a young developing side!

“To fight as hard as we did and so nearly get home against the best side in the country was an outstanding effort – over the last two years we’re improving all the time and we’ve got to keep improving and we cant keep making that mistake again when we’ve worked so hard to get a foothold in the game and good sides will take advantage of that really quickly and the games gone!”

Walker did confirm that one man returning to the squad for the weekends return to Canterbury will be Sam Billings after returning from England ODI duty. “Fingers crossed, he’ll be back for the next two games before he returns to the England squad hopefully for the Pakistan series,” the coach revealed.

“He’s not centrally contracted so effectively it is down to us what we do with him. It’s always a massive boost when you get your best players back – I think its something that we’re getting used to but it’s still relatively new for us to have so many away in one go, but I love it – I think its absolutely outstanding that we’ve got international players in our team.

“It inspires and its great to see them on the England stage. But don’t get me wrong when they come back it’s a huge boost to anybody! They love coming back and playing for Kent – their attitudes are absolutely outstanding, and they want to come back and play. So have Sam – the captain – come back and be part of it is great, and he’ll give us a bit more stability in our batting.”