From Bharat Kirthivasan, United States

Fans celebrate Sachin Tendulkar's historic feat © Getty Images

This is not a post on the unbeaten 200 by the great man. This is merely an answer to a question that was put to me on Friday. So here goes.

Having woken up early to watch the match (NY time zone is not exactly conducive to day-night games in India), I was ecstatic (albeit blighted by a headache) in college where I happened upon a classmate. A discussion on the match ensued. She remarked (or rather questioned): “I wish I could have watched Sachin go past that milestone. Why is my luck so bad?” (or something to that effect). Here is my answer to all those who have missed watching the record even though they were free. That innings is a gift to me and those like me. The fools. The ones who sat watching every match the little man played in the golden 90s (an era of cricket that seems to have died these days).

We watched Sachin decimate every opposition back then. Funny how the word decimate is often used to describe his exploits. He always wore a No.10 T-shirt. Tendulkar! We fools (and there are millions like me) had systolic blood pressures in the extreme highs when he beat a murderous McGrath to submission at the Wankhede in the 1996 World Cup. We bawled like babies when Mark Waugh tricked him into charging a wide ball only to! (Fellow fools need not be reminded.) We remember mourning him being adjudged caught-behind against the Windies (back when they were somewhat formidable) even though the ball had scraped his shoulder. (That umpire must have been hiccuping blood for days.) We nuts had our underwear in a bunch when Shoaib Akhtar proclaimed he would take Sachin’s wicket, and then did so. At that moment Shoaib got our unwavering hatred and respect. Small setback you might think, but it was first evidence that there exists something which travels faster than Sachin’s speed of thought (there is always light at 299,792,458 metres per second, but I am sure Sachin’s brain is not far behind).

Bowlers had to be careful sledging the great man (few ever had the stones to do so) for fear of retributions, and repeat offenders had their careers ruined. We optimistic idiots held our breaths as Adam Bacher (having no other claim to fame) stuck out one hand and ended one of only two memorable things (the other was Azhar’s knock) about the Cape Town Test. We, only we, can understand the almost maternal way we prayed that Sachin would not come on strike when some bowler was exceptionally ferocious, knowing full well but not wanting to accept that he is only mortal. Reason was abandoned in exchange for faith when he charged Michael Kasprowicz and pulled him for a six, not to mention the very next ball (again: fellow-fools need no reminder). Food was trapped right in the throat when the genius chose the over before tea to hit a round-the-wicket Warne over deep midwicket. There was no way to explain how his mind worked. It sufficed us to see that it did and how.

Indian cricket has other heroes, but this man was omnipresent during a match. Rolling his arm over and producing turn that would make Warne proud, or horizontalizing his diminutive frame to prevent conceding the extra run, or walking over to the bowler and explaining something in his, ahem, less than exceptional voice; it was impossible to calculate the impact of this man’s presence on India’s win-loss probability. We crazies oohed and aahed like parents watching their first-born learn to walk when he returned from his back injury to become a slower, slightly unsure version of himself; not the kind who put bowlers in peril, but accumulated runs while inventing shots all the same. The paddle sweep, the deliberate edge over keeper/slips and others would not have been created had his back injury not happened. Who knows, this might have helped him make the transition from an annihilator to accumulator.

That, however, has not been the case over the last two years, a period which shows him at his dangerous best because of his repertoire of booming shots coupled with the cheekiness he has later added. We caused water crises in India by standing for hours in the shower practicing shots with the one-piece bat used for washing clothes (pointless: most of us had a washing machine), fantasizing being the non-striker when Sachin bats, or receiving a few pointers from him at change of overs. A few audacious ones even dreamed surpassing the great man. For me, it was the closest to true devotion an atheist could go. Woody Allen famously said: “We don’t know if there’s a god, but there are women. And some of them shop at Victoria Secret!” That can be edited to say: “We know not if god exists, but Sachin exists. And that’s enough.”

So here’s my tribute, not to the great man, (he would be getting enough right now) but to those maniacal followers, who know nothing better, who stand outside TV shops next to pure strangers saying, “Asking rate 8.5 per over? Sachin aahe na? Bara! (Sachin’s there, it’s alright.)

From Balachandhran. S, India

	Sachin Tendulkar scales yet another summit © Associated Press

At its simplest level, sport is about possibilities. We fans dream up spectrums of possibilities. We align ourselves based on these spectrums, pledge our allegiances and set ourselves up for emotional and sometimes even physical reactions based on how things actually turn out. Most times our dreamt up possibilities are restricted by our citizenship - in itself a simple piece of paper, if you think about it.

It is perhaps then all for the good that there still exist a few in the realm of sport who make you forget about these restrictions and think only about the sporting possibilities. It takes no special skill to surmise that I am talking about Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar and the possibilities that only he brings to the sport that he adores and so beautifies and typifies - cricket.

I lay the blame squarely on Sachin Tendulkar - for making it so hard to write yet another article on his prowess and achievements and landmarks, which show no signs of fading away. Superlatives pale. Praise falls flat and comparisons do not seem to fit, if only because we are finding it harder to find appropriate standards of comparison as time goes on. Cricket's prolific writing community has driven itself against the wall praising his two decades in the game. It has worked itself into a fury trying to explain to the layman about his passion for the game; his unsurpassed mastery of the art of batting. It has tired of continuously extolling his virtues on and off the field as a champion and a true sportsman. So much so that when you want to write about Tendulkar or his exploits it pays to take some time to think deeply to try and not repeat either yourself or the numerous others who have tried their hand at the same exercise over the years.

I have a confession to make. Nothing seemed to suggest itself as exemplary enough. As momentous and unique enough to grace yet another occasion, yet another peerless achievement by the maestro. For a while I was stymied when trying to write about his latest achievement - that of scoring a double century in an ODI contest. Yet another time when he carried his bat through and batted for his team's entire quota of 50 overs.

I have heard it said that emotions tend to illuminate even the darkest paths where the light of reason fizzles out and leaves you alone. This is a case in point. If following sport is in essence a vicarious pursuit into which you throw not yourself but your faiths on individual players and/or teams, then nobody qualifies to be a Vicar quite as much as Tendulkar.

The magnitude of emotions, enjoyment and realization he has been able to convey and amplify to millions and maybe even billions of people over the years across borders of nationhood, religion, economic means, caste, creed and colour ensures that it is so. It is not difficult to describe the drives, the cuts, the pulls and the cutest of nudges that he essayed today on his way to the first double-century in one-day internationals. But it would merely be superfluous.

His supporters may very well be in the right if they argue that this was always on the cards. A splendorous 175 four months ago had already tantalised his fans. Informed and tempted them about this possibility. And when a summit beckons, Sachin cannot be far behind. He finds a way to the top. And so it was today. 200 not out off just 147 deliveries against the third-ranked side in the world.

A successful man cannot have people simply singing praises about him. Ask his detractors. They would point out that the Roop Singh Stadium at Gwalior had short square boundaries, lightning fast outfields and an absolute marble-top of a wicket. And they would be absolutely right. But here is something they might consider. Give a top-class artist a canvas. Give him a room and give him a vista. See what he comes up with. For the art produced thereof we credit the artist himself; not the canvas for its whiteness and blankness. Not the room for the comfort it offered. Not even the vista for its having conveniently presented itself. They are all incidental. Art is transcendental. So too is Tendulkar's batting.

Much has been made of his drive for runs. Of the man's sheer hunger for putting bat to ball and staying on there at the crease much to the bowlers' bemusement. Forget the fact that he is largely peerless and matchless. He also appears tireless with the bat in hand when you observe his speed and skill when sprinting up and down the wicket putting pressure on the fielders at 36 years of age. Countless have been the questions posed to him about his desire to play the game and of the day when he wants to hang up his boots.

Perhaps they have been posed in an attempt to find out just how long the game will be graced by his presence. The game's own need of his genius does not however go far when trying to explain his superhuman dedication to the craft of batting and of the sheer determination that has powered him to make several sacrifices in order to be there for his team.

In typical Sherlock Holmes fashion, if we eliminate the possibilities one by one it only leaves one last item. That Sachin Tendulkar needs the game just like we mortals need our oxygen, our daily fix of sports and the fount of vicarious joy it promises. That his bat is not an extension of his body as has been often said. Perhaps quite the opposite - that he is an extension of his bat. That his body arranges itself conveniently so that the bat may strike the ball at the most opportune time with optimum speed.

All the better for our vicarious enjoyment. That he gives of himself every time through his bat so that we may once again experience the heady breathlessness that sports brings into our lives. So that over the years we all have a bit of Sachin Tendulkar in us. And that he suggests, in the true spirit of Vicar-ship, the existence of sublimation and transcendentalism in sport, also leaving us with the comfort that even after he ceases to perform his superhuman deeds on the cricket pitch he will live on in our minds - fuelling our dreams and defining our spectrums of possibilities.

From Alan & Philip Sutherland, Australia

Graham Manou continues a long South Australian tradition © Getty Images

For those to whom an organised fan tour, offering such delights as golf with players and drinks with coaches, has about as much appeal as facing a fit Shane Bond with little but a miniature signature bat for protection, there are alternatives. There is still the odd place, or two, where traditions appear to mean something. In the modern world this makes them very odd indeed.

Take the Adelaide Oval as one such example. Despite some modernisation, this remains a cricket ground - a ground for cricket rather than a stadium for herding cattle into. It comes as no surprise then, that the captain of the resident Sheffield Shield team in Adelaide is none other than one who appears to mirror the traditions of the ground - Graham Manou. Also somewhat of a throwback to a bygone era, Manou is a wicketkeeper's keeper, one who puts his glovework first.

When one thinks of Australian keepers, one tends to think of Queenslanders, New South Welshmen and Western Australians. South Australia, however, has an equally fine tradition behind the stumps. If Jack Blackham, the bearded 19th century Victorian, was known as "The Prince of Keepers" and, as writer Jack Pollard described him, "an original Australian hero", then Arthur Jarvis, an Adelaide coach-builder of rather taller and more solid proportions was the prince in waiting. Fellow South Australian and Test captain George Giffen wrote of Jarvis, also known as "Affie", as an outstandingly courageous taker of pace-bowling, standing up to the stumps to the express Ernie "Jonah" Jones and yet maintaining unbroken fingers.

Undoubtedly, were it not for Blackham, Jarvis would have played more than 11 Tests. Jarvis did, however, manage to win one, according to former English captain Alf Shaw, largely by his own efforts. This was the third Test of 1884-85 at the SCG, where Jarvis took five catches plus a stumping off the bowling of "The Demon" Fred Spofforth.

Better known than the 12-stone Jarvis, was another burly South Australian, Barry Jarman. Even heavier, at 13 stone 7 lbs, Jarman was long in the shadow of Wally Grout. In 191 first-class matches, he completed 560 dismissals, including 129 stumpings. One particular single-handed diving catch off Graham McKenzie in Melbourne in 1962-63 to dismiss England's Geoff Pullar is long remembered.

Trapped between Bert Oldfield and the Second World War was Charlie "Chilla" Walker. Quite possibly the best Adelaide keeper of them all, Walker recorded over three hundred first-class dismissals, an incredible 46% being stumpings. It no doubt helped his cause greatly to have legspinners of the quality of Clarrie Grimmett and Frank Ward in his Shield team. In a match against NSW at Sydney in 1940, Walker completed no less than three catches and six stumpings. Charles Walker died two years later while on active service for the Royal Australian Air Force.

Like Walker, Manou has over 300 dismissals and seems destined to be a Test reserve. With just five first-class centuries and an average in the mid-twenties his batting lacks the gusto of Brad Haddin's. However, Manou's keeping is undoubtedly world class and if it wasn't for the unreasonably heightened expectations from keepers with the bat since Adam Gilchrist appeared on the scene, he might well be accepted as the best in the country. Manou has certainly served a long apprenticeship, whereby his glovework has developed a silky smoothness.

Another who seems set on doing the same, is his state deputy, Tim Ludeman. A country boy, born in Victoria's Western District, Ludeman travelled further west for an opportunity at Shield level. Good enough to open the batting in the shorter forms of the game, Ludeman has already racked up quite a number of catches in just a few matches. One hopes that his destiny is not to be stuck behind Tim Paine. As good as Paine is, there should be enough room in the modern schedule for both of them.

From S Giridhar and VJ Raghunath, India

Bert Sutcliffe, with a heavily bandaged head, smashed seven sixes in an unbelievable counterattack against South Africa © Getty Images

We are both incurable cricket romantics and will carry to the end of our lives the belief that much that is noble about the game will remain unsullied by passage of time. However much the external attributes of cricket may have changed, we believe the intrinsic quintessential qualities of courage and nobility remain forever entwined with the game. In this essay we will describe why courage is such a moving emotion and ennobling aspect of the game.

While this article mainly captures Indian heroics, we also showcase a few from other countries including perhaps the most moving story of courage that New Zealand will forever be proud of.

To regular readers who know our fondness for fielding, it will be no surprise that we begin with stories of fielding courage. Eknath Solkar without helmet at short leg is too well known. But forgotten is the saga of Sunil Gavaskar the fielder. Standing in a Test in New Zealand in 1976 at that same forward short leg, vacated by Solkar, he broke his cheek bone when Lance Cairns (a fiercer hitter than his son Chris) smashed a sweep into his face. A few years later, the summer of 1982, when Gavaskar was captain of a beleaguered Indian team, he stood at silly point and Ian Botham broke Gavaskar’s shin bone with a crack that sounded like a pistol shot. Remember, Gavaskar was captain and could have stationed himself anywhere but opted to be in the line of fire. The fractured shin bone episode became famous as Gavaskar was photographed in crutches with India’s PM and the US President Reagan, at a Washington function a month later. Love him or hate him, one of the world’s finest openers displayed guts while fielding too.

Courage while batting evokes much vivid imagery. Batsmen hit on the face, spitting out blood to take guard again and so on. No story of Indian batsmen grievously injured is more poignant than that of Charlie Griffith felling Nari Contractor in the West Indies 50 years ago. Grainy photographs, black and white in our newspapers, showed the West Indies captain Frank Worrell, distraught and first in the queue at the hospital to donate blood for the emergency operation. Contractor never played for India again but both of us saw him bat with undiminished commitment for West Zone after recovering from the near fatal injury.

At Chennai in 1964, chasing a moderate target set by Australia, India lost four wickets cheaply by the end of the fourth day. On the fifth day morning, Vijay Manjrekar, who had injured his thumb while fielding, now came out to bat with Hanumant Singh. Manjrekar had to cut off the thumb part of the glove since his swollen thumb could not go into any protective covering. Injured thumb exposed, wincing with pain every time he played the rampaging McKenzie, he gave company to Hanumant Singh (playing beautifully) for almost the entire morning session. Finally, at the stroke of lunch, Manjrekar was dismissed. The batsmen who followed failed to take India home and Manjrekar’s heroics went in vain.

Of the montages of courage from the 1980s, there is one story much told, the other rarely told. Mohinder Amarnath, hit by Malcolm Marshall, spat out teeth and blood and had to walk away to hospital. Returning to bat next day in the same blood splattered shirt he hit the first ball – a bouncer predictably greeted him – out of the ground. Never a backward step was his motto. Mohinder’s courage is folklore. But two years earlier, in Australia, India’s Sandip Patil was felled by a bouncer. Carried off, and groggy for the rest of the match, he had a captain who wanted Patil to bat again. Sick and wobbly, Patil came out, battled for a few balls and was duly dismissed. Gavaskar, his captain, applauded him all the way back. For what mattered was that by coming out to bat, Patil had exorcised fear and also communicated that he had done so.

Examples of raw guts and courage are many across the world of cricket over the years. The most moving and compelling story is that of an injured Bert Sutcliffe battling for New Zealand against South Africa in December 1953. Badly injured by a Neil Adcock bouncer, Sutcliffe returned from hospital with a heavily bandaged head and hit seven sixes in an unbelievable counterattack, making 80 out of 105. If Sutcliffe battled physical injury it was poignant that Bob Blair the man who partnered him in this effort had suffered even more grievously. News had just come that Blair’s fiancée had been killed in a train accident. How Blair found the courage to keep his mind in a heroic tenth-wicket stand with Sutcliffe will forever be one of the most amazing stories of fortitude. Finally Blair was dismissed and then he let the tears come. As the pair walked back, arms draped over each other, weeping and emotionally drained, there was not a dry eye that day in the crowd.

Mention of the infamous Bodyline series in 1932-33, is usually associated with the bravery of the Australian batsmen. But the series is also remembered for an Englishman who demonstrated remarkable strength of will. Eddie Paynter was hospitalised with tonsillitis and fever but with England’s batting wobbling in Brisbane, Douglas Jardine asked Paynter to report at the ground and bat. Sick and groggy with medication, Paynter batted for over four hours, spending the intervening night at hospital, to make a gallant 87. England won this Test.

Another great story that comes to mind is Colin Cowdrey coming to bat with his left arm in a plaster against West Indies at Lords in 1963 to ensure a draw for England. This, after Brian Close had played a great innings of courage taking Hall and Griffith repeatedly on his body and not flinching one bit. There is a photograph in Ian Wooldridge’s book “Cricket, Lovely Cricket” on this series showing Close with a towel round his waist displaying the bruises all over his upper body. When the fearsome West Indies fast bowlers visited England in 1976, the selectors asked Close who was 45 years old to open the innings. His reflexes had waned but his ability to take blows on his body and grit it out in the middle was undiminished. Close simply knew no fear. He stood at pickpocketing distance from batsmen at short leg and in that 1963 series caught Sobers off a hook at that position! Close was one of a kind.

There are many stirring stories of bowlers transcending injury and great pain to bowl unbelievable spells. Indians of course will never forget a lame Kapil Dev delivering them a victory at Melbourne in 1981.The most striking story in recent times is that of Anil Kumble on India’s tour of the Caribbean in 2002. Jaw fractured by Dillon, strapped up tight and scheduled to fly back for a surgery, Kumble came out to bowl as he always did – with fierce resolve and concentration; he got Lara with a gem and, arms raised, walked way. However often this vignette is played and replayed, the sheer power of the episode will never fade. To represent bowling heroes from other countries we pick Malcolm Marshall’s spell of 7 for 53 at Headingly in 1984 as an example of indomitable will and courage. Bowling with his left hand encased in pink plaster, Marshall created a unique piece of cricket history.

No essay on courage will be complete unless we salute Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi. Having lost one eye in a motoring accident in England in 1962, Pataudi played almost all his Test cricket with one eye. That in itself has no parallel in cricket history. But at Melbourne, in 1967– 68, Pataudi also had to bat on one leg because he had an injured hamstring. Pataudi was resplendent in a losing cause as he produced two of the most combative innings (75 and 85) in cricket history. Listening to Alan McGilvray over radio and reading Jack Fingleton in the Hindu next morning, it was clear Pataudi's efforts were something truly heroic. That is not all. In 1975, his powers and reflexes gone, Pataudi was smashed on the jaw by Andy Roberts at his fastest in Kolkata. Coming back to cheers from the crowd, after stitches on his chin, Pataudi turned the clock back and exploded with a cascade of boundaries. The blazing counterattack was brief, he made just 36 but as Pataudi walked off , the Kolkata crowd knowing that they will never see him in another Test, stood up to give him an unforgettable farewell.

We have only showcased a few heroes but there are so many more. Players of the unhelmeted era faced Trueman and Tyson, McKenzie, Lillee and Thomson, Gilchrist, Griffith, Roberts and Holding with no arm guards, chest guards or helmets as protection. They had a bat and they had their eyes and reflexes. We invite our readers to share other episodes of bravery and courage.

The next part of this essay will be about stories of great sportsmanship, for as we said before, gentility and nobility like courage have an umbilical relationship with cricket. Nothing can change that, ever.

From Alan & Philip Sutherland, Australia

	Taking the game to the north will produce more Eddie Gilberts © Getty Images

Expanding the Australian domestic season to include early games in the tropical north of Darwin, Cairns and Broome need not be purely about squeezing in more Twenty20 matches. There is an opportunity to further the game as a whole and bring it closer to indigenous communities.

Australian rules football has long stolen a march on Aussie cricket in harnessing the talent of Aboriginal players. Cricket Australia is attempting to address this, but more can be done. Expanding the domestic structure to include the Northern Territory would take the game to the Aboriginal heartland. A six-state competition need not be set in stone. If an even number is required, the Australian Capital Territory (Canberra) could also be included. Aboriginal populations inland in the eastern mainland states would also directly benefit.

Now, football dominates for two simple reasons - money and opportunity. With 16 elite clubs (soon to be 18) and forty-odd players per club, football offers more spots than cricket ever can. A glance through the victorious Australian Under-19 team will show more than one young cricketer still considering the ready-made football alternative. It is time to expand cricket too.

In the decades since the sixth cricketing state was added, Australia's population has about doubled. We are in no danger of having too many teams.

Initially, the territories may struggle, but with assistance to attract overseas and experienced interstate players for the first few years, they may well be competitive. And given time, their rookie system should provide the pathway that young talented Aboriginal cricketers require. For what better cricketing incentive could we offer indigenous Northern Territorians than the chance to play top domestic cricket in Darwin or Alice Springs, rather than relocating half a continent away to Perth or Brisbane?

The same applies for those in the Murray/Darling river basin. To a bush teenager, a move to Canberra may be less overwhelming a change than one to the mega-cities of Sydney and Melbourne. It is time to decentralise cricket in Australia. Let's not just play it in the north, let's grow it there too.

From Imran Coomaraswamy, United Kingdom

Cricket's moral system is under review © Getty Images

The umpire’s word should be final. Questioning the judgement of the game’s arbiters is just not cricket. The ICC’s Umpire Decision Review System, which allows batsmen and fielding captains to ask for on-field decisions to be reviewed by a TV official, is detrimental to the Spirit of the Game and hence a recipe for disaster. Or is it?

I must admit that my reaction to the chorus of criticism directed at UDRS during England’s tour of South Africa by a (predominantly but not exclusively English) collection of pundits has been one of mild amusement. When ECB Chairman Giles Clarke fulminated against the “blasted system” because he felt that a “core principle of cricket” was “being destroyed”, I couldn’t help but chuckle to myself and think ‘here we go again’.

Cricket is a haunted game. It is possessed by a mysterious Victorian Spirit. Many of its aficionados like to think that this Spirit - a moral code - sets it apart from other sports, making it "more than a game ... an institution," as the eponymous hero of Tom Brown’s Schooldays famously remarked.

Set at Rugby School in the 1830s, Thomas Hughes’ classic novel vividly illustrated the role played by public school cricket in the breeding of future empire builders. Meanwhile, other parts of 19th century English society also felt the influence of cricket’s Spirit.

In his English Social History, G.M. Trevelyan wrote: “If the French noblesse had been capable of playing cricket with their peasants, their chateaux would never have been burnt.” The great Cambridge historian believed cricket helped prevent revolution by civilising England’s lower classes. He was right, in the sense that it encouraged them to peacefully accept an inequitable status quo. The “core principle” alluded to by Giles Clarke of not questioning authority is the reason why cricket has been a perennial favourite of ruling elites. Trevelyan’s claim may have been made in jest, but the Spirit of Cricket did reinforce the position of the English aristocracy.

The writer Mike Marqusee (a New York Marxist, once dubbed cricket’s “iconoclast in chief”) perhaps explained it best: “Cricket brought together all the classes on the village green, but it did so in hierarchical fashion.” Playing cricket became a touchstone of Englishness, a measure of people’s right to be included, either in nation or in empire. At the same time, it became a means of ensuring people knew their places, both within nation and empire.

Within the game itself, poorly paid professional players somehow put up with being denied the rights afforded to shamateur Gentlemen until 1962, while Britain’s former colonial subjects put up with the MCC rules until the long overdue democratisation of the ICC in 1993. Just about the first ICC policy to be the implemented against England’s wishes was the introduction of neutral umpires in Tests, more than a century after football had seen the merits of appointing neutral referees. English opposition to the move was accompanied by incredulity at the suggestion that their umpires could ever be accused of bias. (Pakistan, whose officials received a disproportionate amount of criticism in the eighties, had actually been the first country to start campaigning for neutral umpires, back in 1980.) Set against this backdrop, the melodrama surrounding UDRS looks all too familiar.

In opposing the adoption of the system, the ECB found itself in a minority of one. Other cricket boards expressed, and continue to express, concerns about its implementation, but only the ECB has objected ‘on moral grounds’ related to the Spirit of the Game.

I like the review system. It eliminates obvious howlers, gives the on-field umpire the benefit of the doubt in marginal cases and is not overly disruptive to the flow of the game. It also seems that there are fewer instances of dissent and excessive appealing when it is in use. The Snicko-gate controversy during the recent Johannesburg Test was due to a failure by the gaffe-prone Daryl Harper rather than a failure of UDRS.

There is no denying that the system is a work in progress, however. New pieces of technology are being added one by one as the cricketing community becomes more confident in them. When UDRS was first introduced, the third umpire could only avail himself of super slow-motion footage, stump-microphone feeds and the ball-tracking part of Hawk-Eye. Now the latter’s predictive element is also in the decision-making toolkit, and soon Snicko and Hotspot will be standard issue too. While the amount of gadgetry employed is on the rise, the limit to the number of referrals permitted could well fall, in an effort to reduce the frequency of annoying tactical appeals. The limit has already been decreased from three to two unsuccessful appeals per innings and I would happily see it cut to five per match (perhaps with the additional caveat that a team cannot carry over more than three to the final day).

Personally, I am not so concerned about regulating the time taken to deliberate over calling for a review. I am less irritated by having to wait for captains to confer with bowlers and fielders than I am by having to wait for Jonathan Trott take guard. For me, by far the trickiest issue to be resolved is exactly who should pay for UDRS - the host cricket board, the host broadcaster or the ICC - as cost appears to be the biggest impediment to the standardisation of the system’s use. I hope this obstacle is overcome soon, as I wish UDRS every chance of success.

Trevelyan wouldn’t agree, but I think cricket could do with some of the spirit of the French Revolution. I am not suggesting that aggrieved cricketers drag uncooperative umpires to the guillotine, merely that we move beyond sanctifying officials’ divine right to rule one way or another. Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite. Allowing players to challenge umpires in a respectful manner should improve relations between the two. It should remind the more unctuous officials that they are not meant to be the stars of the show and help players see umpires as ordinary human beings, who, for the most part, do a difficult job extremely well. Above all, it should ensure sporting justice is served with greater regularity. I hope the TV replay is here to stay. As for that old Spirit of Cricket, I think it’s time we gave up the ghost.