New Lancashire captain Keaton Jennings has his first decision of the summer to make and he has asked Surrey to have a bat at Old Trafford.

Lancashire give a debut to well-travelled New Zealand all-rounder Colin de Grandhomme while there is a second Surrey debut for Dom Sibley following his return from Warwickshire.

He will open the batting with captain Rory Burns, with England Test stars Ollie Pope and Ben Foakes making a powerful middle order.

Lancashire: Jennings (c), Wells, Bohannon, Croft, Vilas, Bell (wk), de Grandhomme, Wells, Bailey, Williams, Parkinson.

Surrey: Burns, Sibley, Pope, Patel, Foakes, Smith, Steel, Clark, Abbott, Roach, Worrall.

It has been an awfully long time since Middlesex last played Division One cricket.

Relegated back in 2017 among the crossbow incident at The Oval and subsequent slow over rate penalties, it has been a hard road back for the 2016 champions.

But here they are again, taking on Essex in the opening round and they will field first having won the toss at Lord's.

Image source, BBC Sport

The sun is out in Manchester! Who would have expected anything less?!

Well anyone who had the misfortune of being here yesterday when it was a classic L.S Lowry day of soft, persistent rain, as everyone scurried shoulders hunched to take cover.

It feels like the County Championship begins earlier and earlier every year and here is proof - this is the earliest April date that first-class cricket has ever been staged at Old Trafford.

Overnight rain and a top up this morning will delay the start at the St Lawrence ground.

Chance of showers forecast throughout the day so hopefully the weather comes good.

The BBC Weather forecast today is for patchy cloud, bright spells and sharp showers.

An improvement on yesterday morning at least when we woke up to frozen windscreens on cars.

But decent enough you would think to get some play everywhere, except torrential rain-hit Taunton.

Although there are already late starts guaranteed at Canterbury and in the Division Two games at Derby and Hove.

Yorkshire cricket has been in the eye of the storm these past couple of years - even for a county who are more used to being in the limelight than most.

The biggest county in England, so big it has always been divided into three in fact, their cricket team afre also the biggest, having won the most county titles (32).

But, even after all the political in-fighing down the years, they have never had to come though anything as damaging as their long-drawn-out racism inquiry.

Now the dust begins to settle on that, they must set out on the mission to recover their place in Division One, following that extraordinary relegation in September. And they start at home, against Leicestershire.

The other relegated side Gloucestershire start with a Severn Bridge Derby against Glamorgan in Cardiff.

Sussex, who will be supplemented by Australia skipper Steve Smith next month, entertain Durham at Hove.

Derbyshire host Worcestershire, who again start the season with two successive away games (they go to Durham next week), to give their New Road ground further time to recover from its customary winter bombardment by the elements.

The last county to successfully defend their title were Yorkshire in 2015.

The Tykes will not be around in Division One to see what happens this summer, following that final-day relegation. But Surrey are at least led by a Yorkshireman, coach Gareth Batty.

And they start off this season as the bookies' favourites to win it again.

Surrey resume with a return trip back to Manchester, where they lost to Lancashire in last season's final game but where they were also presented with the trophy.

Image source, Getty Images

Warwickshire, the team who sent Yorkshire down in September, can have the first day of the season off, as their game with Somerset at Taunton has already been rain-hit - and abandoned for the day before most people had even finished the breakfast.

In the top flight's other games, we will finally see what county cricket life looks like without Darren Stevens at Canterbury, where Kent host Northants.

As for the two promoted clubs, Middlesex, champions as recently as 2016, host Essex, winners in 2017 and 2019, at Lord's.

And Nottinghamshire, whose last title was in 2010, go to Hampshire, who of course have still incredibly not won it since 1973 - although not for the want of trying and a lot of cruel near misses.

Division One

Hampshire v Notts (Southampton)

Kent v Northamptonshire (Canterbury)

Lancashire v Surrey (Manchester)

Middlesex v Essex (Lord's)

Somerset v Warwickshire (Taunton) - Play abandoned on first day because of rain

Division Two

Derbyshire v Worcestershire (Derby)

Glamorgan v Gloucestershire (Sophia Gardens)

Sussex v Durham (Hove)

Yorkshire v Leicestershire (Leeds)

The first seven-match batch of this season's fixtures will follow an established Thursday-Sunday formula for the first seven weeks of the season.

After the break for the T20 Blast, which will begin with a double bill at Edgbaston on 20 May, there will then be two rounds of Championship fixtures in June, both starting on a Sunday.

There are then three more rounds of red-ball cricket in July, either side of T20 Blast Finals Day back at an already sold-out Edgbaston on 15 July.

There will again be no Championship cricket in August. The peak time of the school summer holidays will again be saved for The Hundred and the One-Day Cup, after which the final four rounds of Championship action are scheduled to take place in September.

And, according to ECB boss Richard Gould, there is no immediate sign of anything much changing any time soon, despite all the debate.

Image source, PA Media

It is all a far cry from when it all began, at Nevil Road, Bristol in 1890, when the legendary WG Grace faced the very first ball bowled in the County Championship by another great old name from cricket's past, Yorkshire's Bobby Peel, on the 12th of May.

It was 1927 before the Championship sneaked into April for the first time. And, for most of its long life as a 17-team competition (between Glamorgan's arrival in 1921 and Durham's inclusion in 1992), the Championship was a four-month season which invariably began on FA Cup final day on the first weekend in May and ended on the last weekend in August, occasionally stretching into September.

Now, to fit in all the other mens competitions, the season lasts almost six months, not four.

Which all leaves us with a lot of time to hopefully try and entertain you, when it's either raining or the action is not as gripping as you might have hoped. Today's rain-off at Taunton being a classic case in point!

At only 14 matches, under the England & Wales Cricket Board's current fixture regime, the County Championship season is now more of a sprint compared to the 32-game marathon it used be in the days of three-day cricket - and prior to the advent of limited-overs cricket, in 1963.

But, for all its longevity (it began just two years after the Football League began in 1988), it is still breaking records.

The 2022 season broke a record for being the longest lasting Championship season, from 7 April to 29 September. And, assuming at least one of this summer's final round of fixtures goes the distance, the 2023 campaign will actually break that record.

This season is also due to last until 29 September - and starts a day sooner. Admittedly, with three breaks in between.

Image source, Getty Images

Good morning and welcome back to another season of County Championship cricket.

It's been 190 days since last we crossed paths.

It was 10 to five on 29 September when Warwickshire fast bowler Liam Norwell brought the 2022 season to such a spectacular final afternoon climax.

The Bears paceman thumped one into the pads of Hampshire last man Mohammad Abbas as he moved across his stumps, the umpire deliberated long and hard, then raised his finger, the Bears had won by just five runs and one of the most dramatic finishes in the whole history of the Championship was over.

Forget Surrey's 20th outright title triumph, completed a week early with ruthless efficiency, it was the relegation tussle that was the highlight of last summer's hard-fought red-ball denoument. And it really could not have got much closer than Warwickshire, county champions in 2021, somehow staying up and sending down Yorkshire instead.

For all the sudden outbreak of 'Bazball talk' at Edgbaston and beyond, if the 2023 season can conjure up anything more exciting than that, then we are in for a real treat.