Batty urges Surrey to focus now

Jonathan Batty says Surrey must begin their promotion bid now

Surrey wicketkeeper Jonathan Batty says his side must start preparing now if they are to bounce back to Division One of the County Championship.

Having failed to win a match, Surrey finished bottom of Division One in the Championship last season.

Batty said: "It is difficult to pick the positives out of last season but from now on we've got to look forward.

"We have got to go away and make a difference next season. We have got to progress and that starts immediately."

Surrey sacked coach Alan Butcher at the end of the season, and the club has brought in Graham Thorpe as their new batting coach.

Batty said: "There are changes happening and that in itself is exciting, (there are) things do develop and change at the club and you've got to go with that, its an opportunity for us all to improve."

After a season where he struggled for batting form, averaging under 30, Batty is keen to look to the future.

And he is relieved to have almost fully recovered from a fractured dislocation of a finger.

Batty sustained the injury while keeping wicket in the final match of the season and says it was much worse than he thought at first.

"It just flicked the end of my middle finger, it felt different, I've broken fingers before but never dislocated one," said Batty.

"As we found out later it was a fractured dislocation. It felt very painful because usually I just give it a bit of a shake and get it strapped up and carry on.

"But as soon as the physio took one look at it and had a little go of putting it back in joint, we realised that there was no chance of me continuing and we needed to get it looked at pretty quickly.

"I think it hit me at 1130 in the morning and by four that afternoon I was in a hospital bed waiting for surgery.

"They cut me open because they needed to pin the bone back together where it had fractured just above the joint. Once it was pinned back they could put the dislocation back and stitch me up.

"The finger is fine, I had two weeks off initially because I couldn't risk getting the fracture to shift at all. They are going to take the screw out at some point, we were debating whether to leave it in or not.

"It was a bonus that I only missed a day or two's play, it was a nasty way to finish the season. With the way we got relegated it finished the season off in a horrible way.

"It's never nice to have that kind of injury but I'm relieved I haven't really missed any cricket."