Chris Silverwood heaps praise on his Essex side and tells them to enjoy being Champions

Essex players are surrounded by fans at the end of play as they celebrate being crowned Champions after day three of the Specsavers County Champions. (Image: PA Wire)

Essex went through the Championship season unbeaten and Silverwood had nothing but praise for the team.

“As a team they’ve got to enjoy this, to start with,” he said.

”You don’t win a Championship every day, and they’ve got to enjoy the pats on the back and take it all in and savour the moment. That feeling they’ve got of winning this now is part of the motivation to drive us forward again next year. So what we’ll do is draw a line under it and come next January all teams are level again. We’ll start again and move forward.

“I’ve got to motivate these guys to do that – and I don’t think it will take much because I think they’ve found that they enjoy winning.

“That’s motivation in itself. It’s an old adage, and it sounds like a cliché, but you can’t allow complacency to enter into it.

“That will be one of the big things: remind them that we are starting again, the disciplines have got to be good and everyone is going to want to beat us this time. We’ve got to make sure we’re up to the challenge.”

Both the team’s batsmen and bowlers were praised by Silverwood.

“The bowling attack have been relentless, they’ve tried to control the run-rate and make life very difficult for the opposition,” he said.

“The batting unit have contributed, too, they’ve done almost equally as well.

“We’ve got an honours board in the pavilion and there are, what, 13 hundreds from eight different people.”

Meanwhile Sam Cook, who claimed his second five-wicket haul in successive games, heads back to Loughborough University on Monday, where he is studying history.

“Across the whole season we’ve bowled teams out in less than two sessions than anyone else,” Cook said.

“It’s been a real strength to get quick wickets in clusters. Today I was fortunate that it was me, but earlier in the season others have done it too.

“We have such a big squad of players, and such strength in depth that there is always going to be someone stepping up to the plate and raring to go. Right now we all want to be part of this team and this set-up. It just encourages you to go out and do more. It’s been an unbelievable year.

“Depending what happens I’ll be available for the first game of next season. I should be available for the whole of next season. Our Loughborough season starts earlier than Essex’s so I may be able to get in a couple of games for them. But I need to sit down and talk about that.”