I was delighted with how my team looked. As is nearly always the case the team on the day had a few changes from my original selection, but I was still very confident in the strength of my team.

Those who have played Sherwood Forest will know what a terrific golf course it is. The recent dry spell had left the fairways firm and running, whilst the greens were a nice pace to putt on, if also a little on the firm side.

We were unable to have a practice round prior to the match (club policy) but Steve Creed had kindly produced a crib sheet giving guidance. This was surely the secret weapon required for the guys who were new to the course.

First out in the morning foursomes was the ever reliable Bromers (James Bromley) and Foss (Sam Foster). True to form they wrapped up a comfortable 4&2 victory. News was not so good in the rest of the order as all our other pairs were well behind. The experienced paring of Stu (Bloxham)and Gas (Antony Gascoigne)did not fire (Gas admitted to hitting Stu in some unplayable positions), Diddles (Dale Middleton)and Chunk (Nicky Jenkins) were struggling on the greens and the Joe/Bink (Harris & Paul Walker) pair were also straying from the fairways far too frequently.

All 3 pairs suffered heavy losses. That only left the Captain/Vice Captain pairing on the course and they were looking down the barrel when they were 3 down with 4 to play. A par, par, birdie, birdie finish on the Sherwood's tricky closing holes meant that a half was salvaged. I felt that this half could well be the turning point of the whole game, but sadly this was not to be the case.

It transpired that Notts have decided to adopt a youth policy for their first team and several first team regulars from the last few seasons are now playing second team golf.

Their quality showed in the difficult, blustery, conditions - conditions which our players struggled to cope with. The news from the course in the afternoon singles was that most of the top order were down in their games (some by a hefty margin) and despite best efforts we were unable to turn the games round.

Only Bink and Karlos (Karl Smith)were able to put points on the board for the 'Bears', the rest of us coming in second best.

This meant that the singles were lost by a resounding 8-2 making the overall result a humbling 11.5 - 3.5 in favour of Nottinghamshire.

Despite the result the spirit shown by my players was excellent. We just came up against a very strong side who coped with the course and the conditions better than we could on the day.

My thanks go to Sherwood Forest for the use of their golf course, to our mascot John Duncombe for his support (eventually!) and finally thanks to the Nottinghamshire Captain Nigel Hadfield and his team, I wish them every success in their remaining fixtures.