THE future of Gavin Hamilton will be under discussion before Durham attempt to beat Leicestershire for the first time in the county championship.

The all-rounder will be 30 next month and is on only a one-year contract following his release by Yorkshire at the end of last season.

Coach Martyn Moxon was confident he could help his former teammate to get back on track, but he played in only the first two championship matches, taking one wicket, before suffering a thumb injury which required an operation.

"It's a dilemma," admitted Moxon ahead of the match starting at Grace Road today. "Unless we play him it will be difficult to make a decision about his future at the end of the season.

"In practice he looks fine, but in an ideal world it would be good to have four other seamers in the team in case things don't go well for him. The pitch looked very green on Sunday, but after a day's sun it might have changed, so we'll have to see what it looks like before we make a decision."

Hamilton could step in for Graeme Bridge if Durham decide not to repeat last week's decision to play two spinners, which backfired when seamers took all but three of the 20 wickets in the match against Derbyshire at Riverside.

The other decision to be made is whether Liam Plunkett or Neil Killeen replaces Mark Davies, who now looks unlikely to be back before the Yorkshire match at Scarborough starting on September 1.

Killeen tends to do well at Grace Road. Apart from his exceptional one-day performances there this season, he took seven for 85 there in the last match of the 1999 season, when Durham clinched their place in the inaugural division one.

But that looks a distant memory now that they are well adrift at the foot of division two, and Killeen's form is a mystery.

With 58 championship wickets in 1999, he had the sort of season which Davies is enjoying now. But he has never threatened to repeat it and has increasingly become a one-day specialist.

"It's interesting why his one-day and four-day statistics are so different," said Moxon. "I'm not sure why it is. He's back in the squad and we'll decide in the morning whether to play him."

After playing in Sunday's totesport League defeat at Grace Road, Nicky Peng and Gary Pratt returned to play for the A team at Hartlepool yesterday, with Kyle Coetzer retaining his place in the championship side.

As this is Leicestershire's first season out of division one, this is the first time the teams have met in four-day combat since 2000.

The hosts won by 217 runs at Grace Road that year, while the Riverside clash was drawn, as was the 1999 fixture. Prior to that Leicestershire were at their peak and always tended to beat Durham easily.

Now they are not so strong and will be without Phil DeFreitas because of a hamstring injury, so Durham will be keen to bounce back from their disappointing defeat by Derbyshire.

Durham (from): J J B Lewis (capt), G R Breese, G J Muchall, P D Collingwood, M J North, K Coetzer, A Pratt, G D Hamilton, A M Blignaut, L M Plunkett, N Killeen, G Onions, G D Bridge.

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