By Richard Johnson England's star bowler at the Riverside

I'd imagined making my Test debut many times before but I never expected it to be like this.

Taking six wickets was beyond my wildest dreams, but perhaps most surprising of all was that throughout the whole thing I was absolutely calm.

Walking out to bat in the morning I had no nerves at all. In fact I'm often more nervous playing for Somerset.

I kept bowling full and straight and they kept missing them

It was the strangest feeling, as if it was always meant to be.

Seeing quite a few familiar faces in the dressing room helped, of course.

And I always enjoy having a bat first to ease into a game and have a look at what the pitch is doing.

I think I gave a decent account of myself with the bat - 24 runs from 14 balls - and I was bitterly disappointed with myself for getting out when I did.

But that's the way I play. I set my stall out to be positive and every now and then that means that I'll hole out to somewhere like mid-on.

An early first wicket boosted Johnson's confidence

I knew that it was going to come down to between me and James Kirtley - and even when the decision went my way I didn't know whether Nasser was going to give me the new ball.

There's obviously less margin for error in Tests than county cricket and Nasser was quick to suggest that I split the field and bowl for lbws after seeing nothing swing away in my first over.

Even then I was surprised that the ploy worked so quickly.

As soon as I saw the ball thud into Mark Vermeulen's pad I knew it was out.

You never get the release until you see the umpire's finger go up, of course, but, looking back, getting a wicket so early in my spell was the best thing that could have happened.

BEST TEST BOWS Best first innings bowling on Test debut for England 7-46 J Lever v Ind, Delhi, 1976-77 7-49 A Bedser v Ind, Lord's, 1948 7-103 J Laker v WI, Bridgetown, 1947-48 6-33 R Johnson v Zim, Riverside, 2003

And if I thought the first wicket was out, then the second one was even more plum

A few years ago I would have considered myself an out-and-out swing bowler and tried vainly to bowl outswingers, my stock wicket-taking ball.

But I've grown up a lot playing county cricket over the past few years and knew that I had to look for lbws, particularly bowling into the wind.

Then again, getting five leg-befores out of six wickets was taking it a bit far.

I kept bowling full and straight and they kept missing them.

I don't think I can really explain much about the day - my calmness, for one, and quite why wickets seemed to be going down every other over.

One thing's for sure. I'm not expecting it to happen again in a hurry.