DURHAM embark on five days of cricket today grateful that Paul Coughlin has emerged as an all-rounder worthy of a first-team place.

The 21-year-old Wearsider is one of five on development contracts, but only batsman Graham Clark has pressed his claims for the first team.

After being unable to bowl last season because of a back injury, Coughlin took the new ball in the last two Royal London Cup ties and will do so again in today’s final group game at home to Surrey.

The side strain picked up by Graham Onions in Tuesday’s win against Nottinghamshire almost certainly means Coughlin will also be needed for the Championship match at Old Trafford tomorrow.

Chris Rushworth, who bowled for the second team at Stockton on Tuesday, will return in place of Onions today and Keaton Jennings will come in for Ben Stokes, who is with the England squad.

While Durham wait to discover whether Stokes will be released to join them tomorrow, he was confident after his century on Tuesday the team can win without him.

“We have now started to understand how we want to play the 50-over game and we have been playing some really good cricket,” he said.

“The hardest part is that the middle overs leading up to the batting powerplay can go quite quiet, so we have talked about creating some buzz in that period and putting pressure on the batsmen.”

Surrey have yet to win a game in this competition and are the only team in the group who cannot progress to the quarter-finals.

But Durham know they can be dangerous if they adopt a fearless approach, especially with Jason Roy back from England Lions duty.

He posted some impressive Twenty20 scores this season and Surrey also have explosive Sri Lankan Tillakaratne Dilshan in their top order.

The man who invented the Dilscoop opens the innings with Steve Davies, followed by another ex-England oneday man in Vikram Solanki.

With experienced all-rounders such as Azhar Mahmood and Gareth Batty, it’s a surprise they have struggled.

Durham’s Paul Collingwood has surged to the top of the competition’s FTI Most Valuable Player rankings. He has struck a century and two fifties in amassing 282 runs and has taken eight wickets with impressive economy.

Victory should see Durham into the quarter-finals, although they won’t know until the rest of the group have played their final games.