Gareth Batty: It's time to give counties a separate T20 salary cap

This is my 18th season as a county cricketer and, I have to say, the standard at the top level is excellent. I believe Division One of the County Championship to be the strongest first-class competition in the world and a number of Australian players who have experienced it have said the same.

The switch to two divisions in 2000 has been a huge success and has definitely made it easier for players to make the transition from the county game into the England team. Yet the salary cap, by which all 18 first-class counties must abide, means that squads are no longer as strong as they were when I started my career in 1997.

The first XIs are strong but the salary cap means county staffs are smaller and the back-up players don’t have the experience or expertise they might once have had. There are very few senior players taking part regularly in second-team cricket today and, naturally, the most successful sides are usually those who have the strongest squads.

This summer will look a little different from before, with Championship games starting on Sundays and the majority of Twenty20 games on Friday nights. In the latter case, there are clear reasons for the switch and we get fantastic crowds for T20 matches at The Kia Oval. But there’s no point hiding from the fact that it will be difficult for players to adjust between the formats.

It will be a challenge for the coaches to design practice sessions that take account of this. How do they prepare players to tackle 40 overs of white-ball cricket on a Friday and then begin a four-day match using a red ball on a Sunday?

In an ideal world, counties might be able to have one salary cap for T20 cricket and another for the four-day game. That might happen one day. For now, though, we have to focus on getting our season off and running. We start a four-day home match against Essex on Sunday and we’re determined to get our first win of the campaign on the board.

Get your tickets to watch Surrey - featuring Kevin Pietersen and Graeme Smith - in the T20 Blast now at Kiaoval.com