CHRIS Rogers will be fit to return to the Derbyshire side in the first LV County Championship match at Derby in over two months.

Back muscle spasms meant the Australian opening batsman took a longer than intended break from first team action but that has allowed extra time to get him fit again and Derbyshire will have their leading run-scorer available for the game against Leicestershire, starting tomorrow (11am).

Rogers, still the only top-order Derbyshire batsman to score a century this season, was given time off during the Twenty20 Cup campaign but he returned from holiday still troubled by his back and his absence at Chelmsford means he has had no competitive action in a month.

But head of cricket John Morris believes the rest will have done the left-hander plenty of good.

“Chris has been a good, consistent player for us and we need him back on the field,” he said.

“He's had his break and he is fine now and looking forward to playing again. Ideally, we would have liked to have got him a couple of games for the seconds this week had the weather not intervened but I'm sure he'll be scoring runs for us again.”

Rogers will be up against familiar opposition in the coming weeks. A short spell with Leicestershire in 2005 included a double century against the Australians and the next two Championship matches after this are against Northamptonshire, where he spent two seasons.

The question still to be answered is who will open the batting with Rogers.

Dominic Telo was drafted in as a late replacement for Rogers against Essex and did well enough to retain his place at number three, which means that either Steve Stubbings or Dan Birch, the opening pair at Chelmsford, may drop out.

Stubbings, with only one first-class half-century in 14 innings this season, could be most in danger, though Morris would not give any clues as to his intentions.

One man certain to miss out will be Tom Lungley, last season's leading wicket-taker, who is still troubled by a side strain.

The 28-year-old is to be sent for a scan to try to get to the root of the problem.

While Derbyshire were losing to Essex, Leicestershire were being heavily beaten by Worcestershire and, in a tight Division Two, both sides need to bounce straight back.

“This is actually quite an important game for us,” added Morris.

“The break after the Essex game came at the wrong time for us really because, if you lose any game, you want to go straight back out on the field putting that right, instead of dwelling on it.

“I suppose if we were to keep winning one and losing one, as we have, we would not be too far off at the end of the season but we don't really want to lose many more.

“The important thing for me is that we are competing and playing decent cricket and that is certainly something I want to see us carry on doing against Leicestershire.”

DERBYSHIRE (from): Rogers, Stubbings, Birch, Telo, Hinds, Clarke, Smith, Pipe, Wagg, Clare, Needham, Langeveldt.