The 2023 county season has begun at last, and the long warm days of championship cricket stretch ahead of us. But the first round, at the beginning of April, saw a weak sun battling bravely with a frosty wind, and only the hardened supporter was up for the four-day challenge; blanket, thermos, woolly hat and coat as their county armour.<\/p>\n

Somerset\u2019s first game was at home to Warwickshire, and, as a result of the lingering effect on the outfield of a rain-drenched March, the first day was abandoned. The ground was not just wet, more beach-like with its generous spread of sand attracting the gulls.<\/p>\n

It looked unlikely to go ahead at all, but, thanks to the hard work of the ground staff and the open-mindedness of the umpires, who agreed to a 40-yard boundary in front of the Trescothick Pavilion, the game got underway on the second day.<\/p>\n

And so my first BBC assignment \u2013 to commentate on days three and four of the game \u2013 changed to coverage of days two and three of an old-fashioned three-day match.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s impossible to count the number of times I\u2019ve paced my well-trodden lawn as I\u2019ve listened to Anthony Gibson describe, in escalating agitation, a Somerset collapse, a nail-biting victory or a perilous draw. It\u2019s part of the summer. No, it IS summer. To join that voice and become the anxiety-provider, well, that was and is unbelievable to me.<\/p>\n

The BBC County commentary has echoed through my home for many years, and I\u2019ve always cherished the emotions and delight it brings.<\/p>\n

In the changing world, this much-loved service has had to move with the rapidly evolving times. Adaptation has included the employment of a more diverse group of commentators. Thanks to my experience of commentating with Guerilla Cricket, I was lucky enough to be one of the people invited to take on the role of \u2018third voice\u2019.<\/p>\n

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The role, as described to me, would \u2018allow the fellow commentators to have a break but also to provide a neutral voice\u2019. I managed the first just by being there, but the second was tricky. It is, I discovered, incredibly hard to change your mindset from \u2018we\u2019 to \u2018Somerset\u2019.<\/p>\n

On my first day I joined Anthony and his well-established dialogue with Warwickshire\u2019s Clive Eakin.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve never done ball-by-ball\u201d, I say, but then I\u2019m on and, before I know it, it\u2019s my voice that\u2019s heard describing Josh Davey bowling from the River End.<\/p>\n

In my head I\u2019m juggling with good-length balls, hook shots, fielders\u2019 names, fielding positions, the weather, the scoreboard, the score, the local knowledge, the key facts in a player\u2019s stats, the comment I heard on the train, the seagull in a box as I passed on the way to the ground, the fact that Brian the Cat is back. It\u2019s trickier than you think to get them all out in a coherent order, and to decide whether or how to fit them in at all.<\/p>\n

Warwickshire were ahead for most of the game, but at the start of the final day a 5 o\u2019clock handshake looked likely. But then, starting off 108 behind in their second innings, Somerset fell to 127 for 6, making hard work of building a big enough lead. For a Somerset fan, it was a tense last session (it\u2019s lucky I\u2019m a neutral!).<\/p>\n

It was thanks to a mixture of bad light forcing Warwickshire to use slow bowlers only and a mature not-out innings of 66 from an impressive Tom Lammonby, assisted by a belligerent Craig Overton, that the chance of a win was lost. So yes, a handshake ended what was my first ever game \u2018on comms\u2019.<\/p>\n

And for me? Yes, errors a-plenty, but learning and growing in confidence through the two days. As I joined the hardy, satisfied homeward crowd, I went back over the game in my head, practising commentary, feeling a bit like a batter rehearsing the shot they had wanted to play on the way back to the pavilion with their middle stump knocked back.<\/p>\n

In a thoughtful daze I got to the station, where I joined Vic Marks, ex-England and Somerset all-rounder, who had been summarising the game as the newest employee of the Somerset Live Stream.<\/p>\n