Janeiro Tucker has seemingly had a change of heart and looks set to play in this year’s Cup Match at Somerset Cricket Club.The veteran all-rounder, who could not be reached for comment yesterday, trained with the Cup Match challengers last week and is expected to be involved in Saturday’s final trial match in the West End.“He came training on time and looks like he has been doing some work on his own,” a club source said. “I was very impressed with the way he looked in training which is what I would expect from a seasoned veteran like Janeiro.”The electrifying middle order batsman and seam bowler is the son of former Somerset Cup Match skipper John Tucker who currently serves on the club’s Cup Match selection committee headed up by Charlotte (Molly) Simons.The 2007 World Cup player dropped a bombshell last month when he retired from all cricket after becoming disillusioned with declining playing standards.“Cricket is in a bad state,” he told The Royal Gazette in a previous interview. “The standard is not as sharp or the level it used to be which is not inspiring.”Tucker also complained about the current state of umpiring.“The officiating is in a poor state,” he said. “Some umpires are doing good jobs but others are just ridiculous and that’s why players are getting fed up with cricket.”He is the first Somerset batsman to score 1,000 runs in Cup Match and the first to score a century at Wellington Oval.The Southampton Rangers stalwart is one of only two batsmen to have scored three centuries in Cup Match, with his blistering knock of 186 at Wellington Oval in 2001 surpassing the previous record of 173 not out achieved by St George’s’ great Lloyd James at the same venue in 1962.Tucker (1,266) is just 91 runs shy of Charlie Marshall’s (1,357) record for the most runs by a batsman in Cup Match history.In a previous interview with this newspaper the veteran cricketer said his passion for the sport means much more to him than personal milestones.“People fail to realise that I don’t play Cup Match for records . . . I just play because I love the sport,” Tucker said. “I don’t play for records and that’s what people don’t understand about me. They don’t know me and just think I’m this arrogant person who is trying to break all these records and what I’ve done in cricket is above and beyond all the records I have.”Somerset, who lost the coveted Cup Match trophy during a controversial match at Wellington Oval in 2005, are expected to make at least five changes to their team this year in a bid to dethrone holders St George’s.St George’s won last year’s two-day classic in the East End by two wickets, with elder statesman Lionel Cann anchoring the hosts to victory via a counter attacking knock of 49 not out.Cann, who is just 13 runs shy of becoming the fifth batsman to score 1,000 runs in Cup Match, will captain St George’s this year in the absence of Oronde Bascome who is recovering from an appendectomy.