DURHAM yesterday suffered the third washed out day in six since Shaun Tait arrived, leaving the Australian paceman with a maximum of 16 days' play to prove his worth, writes Tim Wellock.

After his nightmare debut against Somerset at the weekend, which featured 21 no-balls in 12 overs, Martyn Moxon and bowling coach Alan Walker have been able to work with Tait for only a couple of hours when they arrived at Colchester on Tuesday afternoon.

Since then the Castle Park ground has been too wet for practice and after heavy overnight rain there was never much chance of play yesterday.

Despite good drying conditions in the morning, two further downpours left the ground saturated and prospects for today are not good either.

Through no fault of his own, the unfortunate Tait is contributing to what has turned out to be a massive waste of money by Durham on overseas bowlers this season.

They can justifiably claim to have been jinxed as it began with Reon King repeatedly running through the crease and has finished with Andy Blignaut and Tait bowling no-balls galore.

Inbetween there was Shoaib Akhtar, who played in two championship matches out of nine while he was here and rarely looked interested. Shoaib did at least have the respectable average of 27.25 from his eight wickets, while King's five wickets came at 41.2 and Blignaut's four at 50 apiece. Add in Tait's figures from the Somerset game and the overall average for the overseas quartet is 43.75.

It was initially hoped that Shoaib would be here from the start of the season to mid-August and would repeat last season's efforts, when despite often going through the motions he also blew extremely hot at times and won matches.

The lesson must be not to sign pacemen on short-term contracts, especially if they haven't bowled in a match for a while.

This is reinforced by the fact that three of them have had run-up problems, while Shoaib arrived still carrying the rib injury he had picked up playing for Pakistan against India.

He was also ill twice during his two-month stay, while Blignaut's five-week visit ended with a chest infection which restricted him to two championship games.

If Durham do bring back Martin Love next season expect them also to enquire about his Queensland teammate Ashley Noffke, whose seam bowling impressed at Middlesex two years ago.

Meanwhile, Tait's only chance to impress at Colchester is likely to come tomorrow, when the forecast is good.

After that Durham have four days against Hampshire, who will have Simon Katich but not Shane Warne, starting at Riverside next Tuesday. Then comes the crucial totesport League visit on Sunday week of Sussex, who have moved above Durham into the increasingly tight promotion battle. This week's results mean Durham can still go up if they beat both Sussex and Yorkshire.

Whatever part Tait plays for the rest of the season, remember the name. He will probably return with Australia next summer and create havoc in the Ashes series.

Read more about Durham County Cricket Club here.