A four day win at last for Glamorgan at Northampton but any joy from that - and it is not inconsiderable - must be tempered with the disappointment of last Wednesday's C&G Trophy defeat against Derbyshire.

Many people have been joking that we seem unable to play with a red ball and white clothing while we seem invincible with a white ball and coloured clothing.

And after that defeat by Derbyshire, I was beginning to believe them.

I thought our total of around 250 was a defendable one, having been put in on a damp wicket but their quartet of overseas players - I have to have a dig about EU players - made batting look straightforward.

We actually thought that we had got rid of the danger men in their bona fide overseas batsmen of Michael Di Venuto and Shahid Afridi but along came Andrew Gait (born in Zimbabwe, raised in South Africa) and Chris Bassano (born in South Africa and raised in Australia) to spoil our day.

Not that it was a bad day for the rugby players of Bridgend who were there en masse to enjoy a day's hospitality to celebrate their Welsh Premier League title.

A few of them, however, may have been cursing Dean Cosker late in the day when the left arm spinner got hit for three huge sixes by Bassano - all in close succession.

At that stage, the inevitable drinking games had kicked in and, for every six hit, the rugby lads had to down a pint, so there was some rapid consumption required.

So that may be used in slight mitigation for some of them being less than complimentary about our performance when we met them later in a local hostelry.

I did not venture to Northampton, preferring instead to take in a couple of rugby matches and also get cracking on my book - Opening the Face - which will hopefully be published by the start of next season.

It will obviously be autobiographical but I will be attempting to shed as much light on the characters around me during my career as myself.

I have agreed a deal with First Stone Publishing who are actually based in Lydney. One of the owners is a chap called John Sellers who published Jonathan Agnew's "Eight days a week" diary when he was playing county cricket.

I shall be writing it all myself (some 90,000 words have to be done by the end of November), so it will be some challenge. But, as I have always stated my desire to go into journalism when my cricketing career finishes, it will be an excellent exercise.

And with my current injury dragging on, I have plenty of time on my hands.

The latest on my knee is that I am now into my second week of rehabilitation, which involves lots of strengthening of the muscles around the injury, but, as yet, there is little sign of me being in a position to run. So it is just a case of being patient.

I am lucky that Dean Conway, who has stood down from being England's Test physio and is just doing the one day games, has been around to help me.

Dean is a good personal friend - he introduced me to my wife - and has very kindly been putting in the hours with me while Erjan Mustafa, the Glamorgan physio, is away with the first team.

Unfortunately, Dean has accepted an offer to go on rugby tour with Crawshays to Poland this week, so I will be left to my own devices for a few days!

But, there again, I suppose there is my wife, who has recently received the good news that she has been appointed the new physio for the Cardiff regional rugby side next season. Unfortunately, such is the volume of injuries at Cardiff, she barely has time to look at my poorly knee when she comes home. Can't blame her.

Last week's announcement of the England one day squad predictably contained no Glamorgan players. I thought Mark Wallace may have had a chance with Chris Read's injury but that does not seem as bad as first feared.

But the one I am still flummoxed by is Robert Croft. For me, he is still the premier one-day spinner in the country, and his batting has matured noticeably over the last couple of years.

And he has also worked hard on his fitness to increase his mobility in the field.

So his continued absence baffles me. I have said before that I thought he was wrong not to go to India a couple of winters ago but surely that still cannot be counted against him.

And I believe that he will still be in contention come the next World Cup, so the selectors cannot use the age issue as an excuse.

Steve James