FORMER England team-mate Mark Butcher has been promised a tough time by Steve Harmison when Surrey visit Riverside for the LV County Championship match starting today.

Butcher is among those who have recently had a dig at Harmison, who responded by saying: "I'm looking forward to seeing him from 22 yards."

Former England coach Duncan Fletcher jumped on the bandwagon at the weekend by asking: "Why does Harmison need things like that to motivate him?

He should be the No 1 bowler in the world, but he can't seem to be able to put it all together."

Harmison bowled superbly against Surrey at the Oval last season, taking seven of the 14 wickets Durham captured in a six-wicket defeat.

Coach Geoff Cook leapt to his defence after Sunday's Friends Provident Trophy win against Yorkshire, saying: "It's not easy when you have had a lot of vitriol thrown at you to go out and perform in front of the Sky cameras.

I thought he showed a lot of character and he was looking a lot like his old self towards the end."

An unbeaten 68 by Rikki Clarke took Surrey to victory at the Oval last year, but he has left to captain Derbyshire. In the return fixture at Riverside, Jon Batty ground out a second innings century to save Surrey from defeat, so Durham will feel they owe their visitors one.

With Neil McKenzie coming in at No 4 for his championship debut, Gordon Muchall has been left out of the 13-man squad.

Durham must decide whether to hand the fourth seamer's role to Ben Harmison, who would strengthen the batting at No 7, or choose between Mark Davies and Neil Killeen.

Despite Killeen's fine early season form, they will be keen to give Davies a game as he has often been a prolific early-season wicket-taker.

The last time Surrey visited Riverside in April, they arrived as champions in 2000 and lost by 231 runs. The survivors from that side are Butcher, Batty and Alistair Brown, while the only members of the Durham team for that match in today's squad are Harmison and Killeen.

Surrey have replaced Clarke by signing left-hander Usman Afzaal from Northamptonshire and he was one of three century-makers, along with Butcher and Mark Ramprakash, in last week's draw against Lancashire at the Oval.

Ramprakash needs two more hundreds to become the 25th person to score 100 first-class centuries.

Australian seamer Matt Nicholson returns after missing the Lancashire game through illness and is likely to open the bowling with Barbadian Pedro Collins, a Kolpak signing who has played in 32 Tests.

They will be supported by another West Indian, the highlyrated all-rounder Chris Jordan, who has quit his two-year scholarship at Dulwich College because Surrey want him full-time.

DURHAM (from): D M Benkenstein (capt), M J Di Venuto, M D Stoneman, K J Coetzer, N D McKenzie, P Mustard, B W Harmison, L E Plunkett, P Wiseman, G Onions, S J Harmsion, M Davies, N Killeen.