The Tasmanian left-hander is due to make his debut in tomorrow's day-night friendly against Kent even though he will still be recovering from a 24-hour flight which started in Hobart and involved stopovers in Melbourne, Sydney and Bangkok before he arrived in London yesterday morning.

"It was a long flight but I'm looking forward to playing again on Thursday," he said.

"It's only a friendly but I believe you should give 100 per cent in every game you play.

"It's under lights which will be good and the club are expecting a few people to turn up."

Di Venuto finished the Australian season with an average of 42 after disappointing scores of 2,15 and 3 in his last two games as Tasmania, runners-up in the Sheffield Shield last season, only just avoided the wooden spoon.

But he made a half-century in a grade cricket semi-final for his club, King Borough, against his old team, North Hobart, and says he feels in good shape.

"I was disappointed with the way I finished, but an average of 42 was okay and four of our ten Shield games were rain affected which didn't help, so it could have been even better.

"I feel pretty good. I met most of the guys yesterday and they seem a good bunch, they have obviously been working hard in pre-season."

Sussex plan to field a strong side against Kent in tomorrow's opener which will be played under National League rules, starting at 3pm with 45 overs per side. They will finalise their side today.

Kent have left out England paceman Dean Headley and former Sussex skipper Alan Wells. Matthew Fleming captains them for the first time.

Kent (from): Ward, Smith, Fulton, Walker, Fleming (capt), Marsh (wk), House, Thompson, McCague, Phillips, Scott, Ford, Hockling.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.