WITH the season fast approaching its climax it's another big week for us. They are all big weeks from now on.

We did well to beat Hampshire in the 40-over on Sunday and results elsewhere went our way too.

The win against Leicestershire, meanwhile, means we can go into the game at Durham on Saturday still with a chance of making the semi-finals.

In between we're at Warwickshire in a County Championship game scheduled to finish on Friday. They're on the same points as us in the table but have played a game more, so we have to get something from this one.

At the moment we're not worrying so much about individual opponents, instead we are taking every game as it comes. We need to play to our full potential.

Durham are a strong team but have underperformed this season, and they would be the first to admit that.

They have a very good bowling line-up, a mixture of good seniors and some promising youngsters.

They've had a lot of success in recent years in four-day cricket but are still a pretty useful limited overs side.

But we will be going there to win.

Then we're back to County Championship cricket with our penultimate Division One game of the season away to Hampshire. They're all crucial games at the moment for us and this is no exception. Again we need to get something from the game, especially with Yorkshire away being our last game.

The news has broken this week that Kent have decided to release certain players at the end of the season, most notably Amjad Khan.

I would be lying if I said that it hadn't affected the mood in the camp. It's always sad to see players leave.

Obviously the club finds themselves in a financial situation which means they are unable to offer Amjad a contract, which is a big disappointment.

It perhaps hints at the direction Kent could go in the next three or four years and it's not necessarily the direction most of us would want to head.

But obviously when it comes to cricket everything has been overshadowed by the allegations this week surrounding Pakistan. There have been rumours floating around for years about this kind of thing going on in cricket but it's still a bit of shock, more so given the way in which the story emerged.

For me it's a great shame because whether the allegations are true or not the whole sport will be tarnished with the same brush, which is what happened with the Hansie Cronje business some years ago.

Cricket has always been regarded as something of a gentleman's sport and there's no place for this kind of thing, in any sport for that matter.

What's happening is going to hurt the game on many levels. Advertisers and sponsors could pull out and that could have a real knock-on effect.