It’s hard to argue with Robin Martin-Jenkins’ best County Championship XI of the decade in the February issue of The Wisden Cricketer. So I won’t. Instead I’m going to offer an alternative team that I feel could compete with his.

For those of you who can’t be bothered to open the above link, here is RMJ’s team: Nick Knight, Rob Key, Mark Ramprakash, Murray Goodwin, Stuart Law, Chris Adams (capt), Nic Pothas (wk), Kabir Ali, Andy Caddick, Mushtaq Ahmed, Steve Harmison.

And here is my team:

1 Marcus Trescothick (Capt)
There is simply no English opener capable of inducing as much bed-wetting among bowlers as Tresco.

2 Vikram Solanki
Underused by England, a brain as sharp as his fielding and one of the country’s most attractive batsmen. Cricket’s first-ever supersub is a definite starter, and there will be no more entertaining opening pair in the land.

3 John Crawley
Mike Atherton reckoned Crawley would score loads of runs for England. He was wrong. But there was no better No. 3 in the Championship last decade. Apart from Mark Ramprakash, but RMJ has only gone and picked him hasn’t he.

4 Graeme Hick
RMJ’s most surprising omission. Hick scored 136 first-class hundreds = he gets in my team.

5 David Sales
He may have ruined his England chances by a) being a bit Samit Patel and b) staying at Northamptonshire, but he’s scored seven double-hundreds. That kind of staying power gives him the nod.

6 Ali Brown
How did this man never win a Test cap, let a lone a place in RMJ’s side? A matchwinner from No.6, he’ll take apart attacks wearied by the colossal run-scoring of the top five.

7 James Foster
Not entirely a biased pick by an Essex fan but more a reward for being the best English wicketkeeper of the last 10 years. And probably the next 10.

8 Dominic Cork
More perseverance than a shirehorse ridden by Fred Trueman and the best bowling action of the last decade. Oh, and 29 more first-class five-fors than Andrew Flintoff.

9 Darren Gough
While RMJ has nabbed the two really successful quicks of the Noughties – Harmison and Caddick – Gough’s nous and penetration more than makes up for the two of them. Hmm. Not even I really believe that, but he was still very good.

10 Martin Bicknell
Better than Kabir Ali. Much better.

11 Danish Kaneria
No one can really compete with Mushy, but Kaneria is the next best spinner. It was either him or Robert Croft.

Daniel Brigham is the assistant editor of The Wisden Cricketer

Follow him on twitter: WisdenCric_Dan