It's official: Sledging doesn't work in county cricket.

For the last few months I've been conducting a little study in my head to help keep me sane through what are often very long moments in the field.

Apparently first invented by the Australians (they have certainly made it into an art form now) sledging is the word coined for the chat that fielders take part in to try and put the batsmen off his game.

A few choice words within a nervous batsman's earshot can alter the way he plays and so win an important psychological battle for the fielding side.

An example if I may. A young debutant comes out to bat against your premier fast bowler. Being inexperienced he will probably not be used to facing fast bowling and so the slips or wicketkeeper might shout to the bowler, "don't be shy" or "have a look upstairs".

The young batsman might then expect a barrage of short-pitched balls aimed at his head (upstairs) and line up to play such deliveries.

He would then not be in a good position to play the double bluff ball of a full length and that would be the poor lad's downfall. You see, there's more to us cricketers than meets the eye. We're quite a cunning lot really.

Not being a huge chatter myself on the field, I have never been the main instigator of any such sledges and I have always been sceptical of how much they actually work anyway.

There are some batsmen in county cricket who seem to warm to a bit of atmosphere from the fielding side.

Jack Russell, for example, seems to positively revel in it and we are always inclined to shut up when he comes out to bat against us with the theory that the silence would put him off more.

That said, it is an integral part of the game today. I receive my fair share of it when I bat and indeed am almost disappointed when I play and miss and don't hear someone chirp up from the slip cordon with, 'bowl him a piano, see if he can play that', or some other such witty remark.

It was during the two back-to-back Championship matches against Yorkshire last month that my theory was hatched. During those games Matthew Wood, Yorkshire's opening batsman, spent all of the Sussex innings standing at slip handing out smug comments to the Sussex batsmen.

The scorecards of the two games tell a picture. Wood barely scored more than 30 runs in four innings against us.

Then, in the most recent Championship match, Kent's overseas player Andrew Symonds barely stopped mouthing off with his strong Aussie twang all game. His scores? Thirty-odd in the first innings and seven in the second.

Two very talented players with a big responsibility to score runs for their side failed and in my book it's all because they had spent too much time commenting on other people's games instead of concentrating on their own.

It has only happened twice which I know is hardly conclusive evidence but I will be keeping an eye on my hypothesis for the rest of the season.

As for me I will be keeping quiet unless I have already batted twice in the match so there is no chance of retribution!