Welcome to the 2012 county blog

Welcome to ESPNcricinfo's live county blog – the home of county cricket.

The forum will play a central part in our extra commitment to the English professional game and we hope that you will play an active role in developing a community that underlines our belief that county cricket remains, in the words of our senior correspondent, George Dobell, "an unappreciated, priceless gem".

Throughout the day our reporters up and down the country will provide a flavour of the matches as they develop on the liveliest, most wide-ranging forum in county cricket.

We hope that you will share your insights with us. Anything relevant, entertaining or pithy will be welcome. Help us to build a community in which we can take pride.

Our renowned live scores service will again run throughout the day and we are also displaying live Twitter feeds from county media officers and a selection of the most thought-provoking independent observers so you can keep pace with opinions and news from around the counties.

In 2012, we are also committed to covering more county news and reports than ever before, all backed up by an unrivalled statistical service, making us the natural first port of call for county cricket on the web.

Match reports on all the counties will be carried on our county cricket home page soon after play ends for the day and will be provided by some of the most respected cricket writers around, including George Dobell (@georgedobell1), Andrew McGlashan (@andymcg_cricket), Jon Culley (@culleycricket), David Lloyd (the real David Lloyd) and Myles Hodgson (@hodmyl), as well as exciting young voices such as Alan Gardner (@alanroderick), Alex Winter (@alexjwinter) and Sahil Dutta (@sahildutta).

There will also be audio and video feeds throughout the season, soon to be led by a short series of interviews with some of county cricket's journeymen by the cricketing iconoclast Jarrod Kimber. We can’t wait to see how they turn out.

And in County Cricket Matters, we have what we are confident will soon be hailed as the funniest and most original county cricket blog around.

So why not make ESPNcricinfo part of your season? And help us prove that county cricket really does matter.

You can get started by reading our Division One and Division Two previews, and commenting below the line here.

Please be advised that we will routinely remove comments from email addresses that we do not believe are valid or comments that do not enhance the debate. This is for your own satisfaction.

You can also report abuse at edit_uk@cricinfo.com