John Hastings admits he has great memories of his time playing for Durham but all his energies will be focused on trying to help Worcestershire clock up another victory in the Specsavers County Championship promotion battle.
The Australian all-rounder spent two seasons with Durham in 2014 and 2015 and is looking forward to renewing old acquaintances during this week’s four-day clash which gets underway at 2pm tomorrow and with a pink duke ball.
But first and foremost Hastings wants to help his current county maintain the momentum that was regained after a couple of blips via the stunning four wicket win over Kent when chasing down 399 for victory.
Hastings said: “I’ve got some great memories of Durham. I had a fantastic couple of years up there. It’s something I’ll always cherish.
“But going back up there, I’d still really love to win and just keep our momentum going here.
“It will be special. I’ll catch up with a few friends I’ve made up there and have a really good week up there.
“They are a fantastic club and I’ve really felt for them over the last year and a bit especially this season with having to start so many points down.
“But they are really well led there by Colly (Paul Collingwood) and John Lewis. Colly is an evergreen really. He trains really hard and keeps himself really fit and is still doing a great job.
“It will be great to go up there and see everyone – and hopefuly get a win.”
Second placed Worcestershire are 26 points behind Nottinghamshire – although they do have a game in hand – and nine points ahead of Kent and their two nearest rivals clash at Trent Bridge this week.
Hastings said: “We are in a very good position. It hurt us those couple of losses we’ve had. If we had managed to sneak a draw out of those, we would be a lot closer to Nottinghamshire.
“Notts and Kent play each other under lights this coming week so that will be an interesting game but we will just focus on what we need to do and trying to keep winning games.”
Hastings has experience of playing with the pink ball in Australia and will pass on his experiences to his Worcestershire team-mates.
He said: “For me, the pink ball doesn’t do as much as the red ball and it only swings for about 10-15 overs and then traditionally in Australia the midde period has been quite flat.
“Then the lights come on and it does a little bit at night. Those are the sorts of things I’ll be passing onto the boys.”
