Durham v Derbyshire T20

You've got to give it to the boys right now, they're playing some good cricket.

169-5 at Durham today would have taken some chasing down, something that Ross Whiteley obviously felt when he tweeted to the world at the end of our innings. At halfway in our innings I wasn't too sure, despite a fine start by Martin Guptill, but he, Chesney Hughes and Wayne Madsen took the score to a level that was going to take some getting. 103 from the last 9.3 overs was an impressive effort.

We'll never know, but full marks to the players. Special mention to Wayne Madsen whose improvisation in the final overs is giving another dimension to the side. We seem to have taken a leaf from the book of the better teams in the IPL, in aiming for ten an over from the start and ensuring that there are wickets in hand for a final assault on the bowling in the last five overs.

We've now played three good sides and been far from disgraced. Although we are second bottom we're only two points from third and have some of the supposedly weaker sides to play and a game in hand. If we retain the current focus and professionalism we won't be too far away at the end of it all.

One thing I think is needed is an overhaul of the points system and I agree with a contributor to the Falcons Forum the other night. That you get the same one point for a rained off match as you do for a hard-earned tie is silly, while I still maintain that if scores are level the side losing fewer wickets should be declared the winner. Remember Lords, 1981?

If I was organising this competition I would change the points system to 4 points for a win, 2 for a tie and 1 for a no result. I'd also award a bonus point for any side that reaches 200, which is an impressive feat, but insert something in the rules that ensured boundaries were a minimum size. Otherwise you'd have teams setting fifty yard boundaries to rack up bonus points every match...

Next up is Worcestershire at home on Wednesday, followed by Northamptonshire away on Friday and Leicestershire at home on Saturday. A couple of wins from those games and we'll be very much in the mix.

Keep it going lads. This is impressive stuff.