Root’s childhood friend Renshaw standing in the way

ENGLAND Test captain Joe Root has hailed the dressing room environment at Yorkshire as he prepares to make his comeback.

Root is inked in to play two County Championship matches before the summer internationals begin against Pakistan next month.

He faces fixtures against champions Essex and Surrey at Chelmsford and The Oval, respectively, the first of which starts a week on Friday.

“They are two big games. I always love coming back and playing for Yorkshire,” said Root.

“I’ve got some really strong mates who I’ve played all the way through with from being 15 years old.

“I’ve been lucky enough to have Jonny Bairstow around all the time in the Test side but, when I come back to Yorkshire, it’s like I’ve never been away.

“We’ve got a good squad of players, and I’m fully confident we’ll have a good summer under Gary’s (Ballance) leadership.”

Root returns to county duty alongside Bairstow, and they will be hoping join a side on a roll.

Having beaten Nottinghamshire by 164 runs at Headingley on Monday, they travel to Taunton to face Somerset on Friday aiming to make it two wins from three matches.

After the Essex and Surrey fixtures, Root and Bairstow will face Pakistan in a two-Test series, which includes Headingley from June 1-5.

Yorkshire head to Taunton on Friday hoping for a similar outcome to last June when they won a thriller by three runs. It proved to be crucial as they narrowly avoided relegation.

Somerset won their opening match against Worcestershire inside three days, with overseas Australian batsman Matthew Renshaw scoring a debut century.

Renshaw was born in Middlesbrough before his parents emigrated, and he is a childhood friend of Root’s with the pair’s parents having played together at Sheffield Collegiate.

Coach Andrew Gale said: “Taunton is always a tough place to go. I’ve looked at the footage of how they’ve won this week, and it doesn’t seem that they’re playing on sandpits any more. We look forward to going there.”

Gale did not include a frontline spinner for the first two matches but Azeem Rafiq and Karl Carver come into contention.

Seamers Steve Patterson and Matthew Fisher are unavailable as they recover from a broken finger and a torn side, respectively.