Wandsworth’s Rory Hamilton-Brown admits he has a lot to learn, but is going to give everything to make life as Surrey skipper a success.

The 22-year-old starts this season as the youngest captain in the LV= County Championship Division Two when the Lions take on Derbyshire over four days this week.

Hamilton-Brown, signed from Sussex in the summer, started his career at the Oval and returns to a dressing room containing experienced internationald and county campaigners in Mark Ramprakash, Chris Tremlett, Gareth Batty and Andre Nel.

That is complimented with a host of young cricketers - including Banstead’s Matt Spriegel and Arun Harinath - who earned their stripes in last season‘s disappointing campaign, which brought one championship win all season.

And Hamilton-Brown, who has the full backing of cricket manager Chris Adams, insists he is up for the challenge to turn the club’s fortunes around.

“To captain you home county is a dream come true, but I admit I have got a lot to learn,” he said.

“There is two aspects to the job; my captaincy and my game. Both things I have to learn.

“I’m confident I can do it and will be doing everythnig I can to make sure it is a success.”

Adams used 27 players in the first team last summer as he made some harsh judgement calls in bringing the curtain down on the Surrey careers of long-serving wicketkeeper Jon Batty and Banstead’s Scott Newman, alongwith seven others.

Spriegel and Harinath did enough in the final month of the campaign to show they were worthy of another shot at first-class cricket this summer under the new regime.

And while Adams is hoping to be challenging for promotion come the end of the campaign, he insists he is looking no further thant the season opener against Derbyshire at the Oval starting on Friday.

“We made some difficult decisions but the 20 players here have been identified as players with the potential to take this club forward,” he added.

“They are good people and good cricketers with the potential to be great cricketers.

“Expectation levels are always high. We will aim for promotion, to qualify for the Twenty20 quarter-finals and to be near the top of the 40 over competition.

“It is a cliche, but we will be taking it game by game, day-by-day, session-by-session and hour-by-hour. That is as far as I’m looking.”