IT is more than a decade ago now, but Graham Onions can still vividly remember his first experience of life as a Durham cricketer.

He was a cocky 18-year-old fast bowler, offered a chance to impress academy coach Geoff Cook after impressing at a regional trial at Gateshead Leisure Centre. At the other end of a pock-marked strip of Astroturf that had seen better days stood Martin Love, a gnarled and experienced batsman who had seen it and done it countless times before.

Flushed with the vibrancy of youth, Onions hurtled into the crease and sent down a succession of short-pitched bouncers. Suffice to say they did not have the desired result.

“I always went to the county trials, although I was never really quite good enough to make the team,” said Onions, who has been reflecting on his ten-year career at Durham Emirates ICG as he prepares for the start of his benefit year, which was announced this week. “If I’m honest, I didn’t really know who Geoff Cook was back then, but at the time, one of the coaches said, ‘Can you go upstairs, there’s a guy who wants to speak to you called Geoff Cook’.

“I went up the stairs and he asked whether I’d be interested in coming along and bowling at the first-team lads on the following Monday morning. I couldn’t believe it.

“It was freezing cold, and I remember bowling at Martin. He had two woolly hats on and his helmet over the top. It was soaking wet, and I remember Geoff saying to Martin, ‘Would you mind if that lad bowled at you?’

“So of course I was young and naive, and I was bouncing him and trying all sorts to get him out. He just stood there and played it so easily because he was such a good player. The bounce was uneven, the ball was pitching and there was water flying everywhere, but he didn’t even bat an eyelid.

“When you look back, of course you remember the Ashes and your five-fors, but it’s those early memories that are what it’s all about. I can still remember that first morning as clearly as if it was yesterday.”

Regardless of his ineffective exuberance, Cook must still have seen something in the Gateshead Fell teenager he felt was worth pursuing, and Onions was duly offered a place at Durham’s exalted academy, which had already overseen the progression of Paul Collingwood and Steve Harmison into the England national team.

However, with the offer of a place at Leeds Metropolitan University to also consider, it was not simply a case of Onions, a talented junior badminton player, immediately taking up Cook’s offer.

A fervent Newcastle United football fan, born into a family that had no history of playing cricket, Onions had stumbled upon the sport rather than seeking it out.

Had he been forced to move to a distant county to pursue a cricketing career, Onions freely admits he would almost certainly have pursued alternative avenues. Having pledged to provide an opportunity for North-East youngsters to succeed on home soil when they pushed for Durham’s integration into the fully-fledged county game, Durham’s first-class forefathers can therefore cite Onions as a perfect example of the wisdom and success of their vision.

“If Durham hadn’t existed, I would probably have gone to university,” said the pace bowler. “Now, I can’t imagine not playing, but back then, I could easily have taken a different option and gone somewhere else.

“I could have gone to uni and then tried to come back into the game. It would have been much harder if I’d had to move away to get a chance to play cricket. At the time, I didn’t really know what Durham was all about, but I soon realised that if you worked hard, you’d get a chance.”

That chance arrived when Onions made his first-class debut in a university match in 2004, and within a couple of years, the Tynesider was regularly opening the Durham attack.

He has gone on to take 459 first-class wickets, play a prominent role in all three of Durham’s County Championship victories and also make a significant contribution to one-day successes in the Friends Provident Trophy and Royal London Cup.

Darlington and Stockton Times: BACK BOTHER: Graham Onions

He has also made nine Test appearances and played in four international ODIs, with his role in the successful 2009 Ashes series ensuring he will always have a place in the annals of the English game.

So what have been the highlights along the way?

“People always say, ‘What’s better, your Ashes-winning medal or your Durham medals? They’re equally as good,” he said. “I’m unbelievably proud that I’ve achieved some great things in the game, like playing for England, but equally I was given an amazing opportunity to play for Durham, the county I actually love. Hopefully I’ll finish my career here.

“To know that you’ve played a part in a Championship win, especially the most recent one, you feel as though that’s what it’s all about. Maybe I’d think differently if I’d played 70 Tests and hadn’t played much for Durham, but I was given an opportunity by Durham which I’m hugely grateful for.

“And I’m not finished yet. Colly (Paul Collingwood) keeps saying next year might be his last – I want to win a trophy for him. I want to keep on winning games and trophies for the senior lads and the club, which has gone on an amazing journey.”

Over a ten-year career, you are not going to have everything go to plan though, and as well as some notable highlights, there have also been some low moments along the way.

The serious back injury that sidelined Onions for the whole of the 2010 season and threatened to end his career presented an obvious challenge, with a related problem reappearing last season to necessitate further surgery, which will take place on Monday.

A failure to consistently win over the England selectors has also been a feature of Onions’ career, with one snub, ahead of the 2013 Ashes Test at Chester-le-Street, proving especially hard to bear.

“I’m normally a glass half-empty kind of guy, so I’d normally be fairly unsure about my place in the team,” he said. “But in the build-up to that Test match at Durham I just had that feeling that I was going to play.

“I did the press conference and I was ready, I felt as though I wanted to play. It was a great feeling, then all of a sudden I was in the shower and Cookie (Alastair Cook) said, ‘Sorry, you’re not going to play’. I was like, ‘Oh.’

“It was heartbreaking really, it was so disappointing. I always thought ‘Be prepared for the worst’, but that time I felt good. But they went for (Tim) Bresnan and won a good Test match on a wicket that did a little bit.

“My second Test match was at Durham and it would have been amazing to play in front of a full crowd, especially against Australia. But what are you going to do?”

* Graham Onions’ benefit year will help raise funds for four North-East charities – the Special Care Baby Unit at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Gateshead, the Sir Bobby Robson Foundation, the PCA Benevolent Fund and Steve Cram’s COCO (Comrades of Children Overseas) charity. For further information, visit grahamonionsbenefityear.co.uk or follow @BunnysBenefit on Twitter.