Paul Grayson pondered Essex's hat-trick of one-day losses and said he was looking forward to a return to the four-day format.

The county blew their Twenty20 Cup hopes with two straight defeats on Friday and Saturday, before going down in a tour game to Zimbabwe by five wickets yesterday.

Mighty blow - Darren Robinson blast the ball towards the boundary during Essex's match Picture: SEANA HUGHES

But vice-skipper Grayson, whose team play Kent in the County Championship on Friday, said: "The mood in the camp is OK, but it will be nice to get back to playing four-day cricket again.

"We've been playing a lot of one-day cricket in recent weeks and we haven't done as well as we would have liked.

"But it will freshen us up to get back into the four-day game.

"It's a totally different discipline, a totally different format, with more time to play and more tactics to use."

Before that, though, Essex have another Twenty20 Cup game to play against Middlesex tomorrow.

Grayson admits he has been disappointed with the county's form in this new competition after three defeats out of four left them bottom of the southern division.

Losses to Kent, at home, on Friday and Sussex, away, on Saturday, sealed their fate.

Grayson said: "We have to accept that we didn't adapt as well to the Twenty20 format as anyone else."

Published Monday, June 23, 2003

Brought to you by the Evening Gazette