We arrived in Sydney on Saturday evening Australian time which is 11 hours ahead of the UK and Ireland. We are staying in a suburb to the South East of the city called Coogee.

It’s fairly safe to say that there are worse places we could be. The cricket ground is literally a stone’s throw from both the hotel and the beach.

I’ve got my usual ‘roomie’ in Paul Stirling who has a phobia of sand and beaches so wasn’t too happy when I dragged half of Coogee beach into our bathroom after my recovery session in the Sea!

The set up we have here is fantastic and is certainly giving us great preparation leading into the tournament. Both lunch and breakfast have been laid on for us by the Randwick Petersham club.

We have the use of their ground for the whole week, to do with as we please and there is a gym just opposite which we have access to free of charge. We had our first practice yesterday (Tuesday) after having two light days of recovery after our long flight.

Jet lag has been an issue for most of the squad, lads are up and about early in the mornings, although as I was rightly reminded by Neil Russell of Instonians (don’t judge him for that) it is -2 back home and most people are up by 6.30 in the morning anyway!

It was great to get back to practicing today, to be honest we have been itching to get out there since we got but we have jet lag protocols in place to try and minimise the chances of getting injured.

Instead we have been going for long walks and doing classes at the Titans gym. We’ll now have two more days of pretty hard work on the cricket front before we play a Randwick select XI on friday as part of our agreement to them hosting us for the week.

Ive got to say they are taking their hosting duties unbelievably seriously, guys have taken the week off work to help with work on the ground, there are flags and posters advertising the week up all around town and everywhere we walk people want to talk to us about our chances. It really has been a first class effort by all concerned.

After our game on friday the ICC take over in regard to our accomodation etc and we travel into Sydney city centre where we stay before leaving for New Zealand. We play two official warm up games, both of them at Blacktown Cricket Club which is another district club in the Sydney comp.

It is a little disappointing not to be playing at least of our warm ups at one of the stadiums but that’s the way it goes. Either way we are now buzzing to get started. It was in the news this week that Gareth Batty is to be the new Surrey captain.

Having stood in for Graeme Smith last year I guess it was natural for some people to think that I would be doing it again come the 2015 season. To be honest it was a bit of a non starter.. There are a lot of Ireland fixtures this summer, Including the T20 qualifiers which take up the whole of July!

I’d be lying if the thought wasn’t on my mind but having spoken to both Graeme Ford and Alec Stewart a couple of days ago, they explained that missing so many games this season effectively ruled me out.

To be honest I had expected that to be the case. Looking at it objectively it is the right decision. They want consistency in leadership and that’s not something I can offer at the moment. Don’t get me wrong, It is something I would like to do but the timing just unfortunately isn’t right and I’m not ready or willing to give up playing one or more formats of the game for Ireland to throw my name into the hat.

I remain both grateful and honoured to have been asked to do the job last year. Leadership is something that I enjoy and I also feel i have something to offer in that regard. It was a great experience last season and something which will stand me in good stead down the line if the opportunity arises again.

Until then I just want to continue on my good form from last season, first and foremost over the next few weeks!