DURHAM are still hoping that Shoaib Akhtar will be fit to return against Division Two leaders Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge in the four-day match starting today.

After missing the defeat by Glamorgan with a rib injury, the Pakistan paceman travelled yesterday with a 13-man squad which also includes last week's deputy, Pallav Kumar.

Neither Liam Plunkett nor Graham Onions is yet fit to return. Onions played in a club match on Saturday, while Plunkett hopes to start bowling again this week.

"Shoaib bowled in the nets this afternoon and we will have to see if there is any reaction," said coach Martyn Moxon last night.

"If he isn't fit Pallav Kumar will play again. The circumstances were very difficult for him on his debut and he came out of it pretty well.

"We had a look at him at the end of last season and he came to some indoor nets in the winter, but he came into the team not really knowing the rest of the lads.

"After his first four overs he came back really well, and in the second innings he bowled better than his figures suggested."

Durham's ridiculously hectic start to the season has seen them play more championship matches than any other county so far. By the end of this week they will have played half of their championship away games.

They have already played Nottinghamshire at home, losing by an innings and 80 runs after being dismissed for 93 in their second innings.

Cornishman Charlie Shreck took nine wickets in the match, but even though he has since been injured Nottinghamshire have hardly missed him as Ryan Sidebottom has come in and done well.

Sidebottom is reported to have been offered £30,000 more than Durham were able to pay to go to Trent Bridge, where the depth of the squad further underlines Durham's lack of resources.

Paul Collingwood will be desperate to make a big score on a ground where he has done well in the past, particularly after Andrew Strauss's success on his Test debut.

Collingwood is in the strange position of being centrally contracted but unable to get into the Test team and after championship scores for Durham so far of nine, four and 14 he is in danger of slipping out of the frame.

If he is in the squad for the next Test starting at Headingley on Thursday week the only Durham game he would be in danger of missing is the totesport League match at home to Scotland on the Sunday.

The third Test at Trent Bridge starts on June 10, two days after the Durham v Yorkshire match, then Durham - and Collingwood - will be idle for a week before he is taken away for the one-day internationals, starting on June 24.

The final of the triangular series is on July 10, so Collingwood will miss the championship match at Cardiff plus six one-day matches, including the first three Twenty20 games.

Durham (from): J J B Lewis (capt), M J North, G J Muchall, P D Collingwood, G J Pratt, N Peng, G R Breese, A Pratt, Shoaib Akhtar, N Killeen, M Davies, I Pattison, P Kumar.

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