England beware! Australia opening batsman Phil Hughes poses a major threat to hopes of regaining the Ashes this summer.

At the age of only 20, the New South Wales player has become the talk of county cricket during his short, but already prolific, period with Middlesex, and I had the dubious pleasure of watching at close hand as he scored a Friends Provident Trophy century against Somerset at Lord's last Sunday.

Happily, we went on to win the game, but I was very impressed by Hughes, who looks really hungry to score runs and has a simple way of going about his business.

He scores very freely through the off side with cuts and drives, often making room to play that way even when the ball is on the stumps, which demonstrates a very good eye.

The cut seems to be his favourite shot and he plays it exceptionally well. He thrives on any width from the bowler and England's attack will certainly need to maintain a tight line against him.

If they do, they might curb his scoring rate because against Somerset he didn't appear to like playing through mid-wicket where so many left-handers get runs. But I'm not sure that tactic alone will get him out.

You only have to check out Hughes' record and how hungry he has been to score runs at the start of his career to realise that he could be a real dangerman.

He scored a century in both innings in only his second Test appearance against South Africa, becoming the youngest player ever to achieve that distinction.

To score big hundreds at top level at such a young age marks him as something special. He watches the ball hard and has a lot of talent.

Now that Australia have announced their Ashes squad the big event seems so much nearer. That also applies because England have finished off their two-match demolition of West Indies and the Aussies are next on the Test match agenda.

You need momentum going into an Ashes series and we certainly have that after what has proved an almost ideal preparation. We shouldn't lose sight of the fact that West Indies were there for the taking in conditions they hate, but so much has fallen into place for England in a short time.

Ravi Bopara has quickly made the problem number three batting position his own and Jimmy Anderson has been the star of a bowling attack who found no problem dismissing West Indies twice in both Tests.

Jimmy has come on a lot. I think the confidence of knowing he now commands a regular place and is the main man as far as our bowling is concerned can only be doing him a power of good. He has gone back to basics and is getting the ball in the right place as well as swinging it a lot. He used to bring the ball in to left-handers, but now he is going across them and causing more problems.

When I was part of England's successful Ashes team in 2005 we went into the series boosted by victory in South Africa the previous winter and having played winning cricket for a couple of years.

It seemed inconceivable that the current squad would have anything like the same self-belief when they lost in West Indies during the winter in the aftermath of Kevin Pietersen giving up the captaincy and Peter Moores departing as coach.

But things are so much more settled now. I can only judge the relationship between Andrew Strauss and Andy Flower from the outside, but I said before in this column that Strauss was the ideal choice as captain and the performances in the last two Tests suggest the pair are working together well.

Importantly, we not only won both games, but won them emphatically. I don't think England supporters could have asked for more and, with Freddie Flintoff hopefully going to be ready to add to the squad, we can go into battle against the Aussies in far better heart than looked likely.

The only sad thing about the Tests against West Indies was the poor attendance. It seemed the credit crunch had bitten and people realise there is an awful lot of cricket to watch this summer with the one-day internationals, Twenty20 World Cup and the Ashes.

We are used to full houses for Test matches in England so it was a shock to see so many empty seats.

Hopefully, there won't be many of those for Somerset's Friends Provident Trophy quarter-final at Taunton and, if the team can maintain the form we showed last weekend to win away at both Kent and Middlesex, we have every chance of progressing further.

Against Kent we put a good total on the board and then squeezed them into submission with our bowling and fielding. That was probably our best performance in the group because they are a formidable one-day side.

Leg-spinner Max Waller made a promising debut. He doesn't turn it as much as our other leggie Michael Munday, but is more consistent in terms of accuracy.

I doubt that many counties have two young leg-spinner competing for a place. It's probably the hardest art form to crack in the game and we must give Max and Michael every chance to succeed.