When Surrey visited Lord's, Middlesex were in disarray. When the Brown Caps travelled to New Road, Worcestershire had just changed their captain. Both Middlesex and Worcestershire were no doubt grateful to Surrey for raising their spirits when they did. So, it will be interesting to see whether Leicestershire will also benefit from playing host to the south Londoners.

With the bat, James Taylor has led the way for the Foxes in the championship this year with 835 runs at an average of 43.94, including two hundreds. Greg Smith, Matthew Boyce and Jacques du Toit have also been amongst the runs recently, though without being outstanding. But, despite dropping back down the order, Paul Nixon has continued to struggle. With James Benning fit again, perhaps the veteran will be asked to sit out this contest.

In their most recent championship outing, at Lord's, Leicestershire bowled Middlesex out for 219 and 255. Prior to that, Derbyshire could only muster 182 and 262 at Grace Road. So, the Foxes attack is producing the goods. Slow left-armer Claude Henderson tops their averages with 46 championship scalps at 20.82 runs apiece, while the lead seamers, both with 39 wickets, have been Nathan Buck and skipper Matthew Hoggard, who are averaging 25.64 and 26.41 respectively.

Arun Harinath has 997 first-class career runs. Mark Ramprakash is 119 runs away from equaling Graeme Hick's county championship run tally of 28,776. Hick is 21st in the all time list, while Ramprakash is currently 22nd. For the Foxes, James Benning and Nadeem Malik start this game with 1,938 f-c career runs and 195 f-c career wickets respectively.

With Stewart Walters dropped, Jason Roy looks likely to make his County Championship debut. Chris Tremlett, who was rested for last Sunday's visit to Wormsley, returns to the fold. But following Steven Cheetham's 4-32 against the Unicorns, Stuart Meaker's place in the side could be under threat.

The weather forecast for day two is dreadful and day three could also catch some wet stuff, so a draw seems to be a nailed on certainty (if I say that, hopefully the rain will stay away!).

G Smith, M Boyce, J du Toit, J Taylor, J Benning, T New (wk), J Naik, C Henderson, N Buck, M Hoggard (capt) and N Malik.

Ian Gould and Vanburn Holder.

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