How do South Africa's busy international cricketers spend the off-season? In the bush, on the beach, and all in white, it would seem. Telford Vice plays Roving Reporter in Supercricket.

Calls to the cell phones of Jacques Kallis and Mark Boucher on Wednesday went unanswered, probably because they were together on a golf course somewhere.

Spiltting the captaincy duties between Andrew Strauss and Andrew Flintoff could work for England, just as it did for Australia, writes Mike Selvey in The Guardian.

For the past 10 months the England team, like Ray Charles with Georgia, have had Michael Vaughan on their minds. His gammy knee has allowed the fellow still referred to as the England captain to play in only two of the last nine Tests and none of the one-dayers since last summer, but no mind. He is still a spectre hanging over the dressing room.

Another cricket talent hunt is going ahead in India. Hot on the heels of Scorpion Speedster, which aimed to find a fast bowler, is Cricket Star. This time the reward (if you can call it that) will be a professional contract with Leicestershire.

The deal has marketing wheeze written all over it, as Niranjan Shah, the BCCI secretary, appeared to confirm. When asked why the board had linked up with Investors In Cricket, the company who are promoting the competition, Shah said: "They are paying us." Can’t argue with that, really. But watch out England and Pakistan – plans are afoot to roll out the competition to these countries, too.

	© The Mirror

In The Daily Telegraph, Derek Pringle admitted that he was at a loss as to a way to turn things round:

“With a whitewash at home only one match away, a malaise has set in for which the only cure is a return to winning ways, though quite how that might be achieved is not immediately apparent.”

In The Guardian, Mike Selvey noted that England’s side was hardly packed with first-choice selections:

“This was a scratch England side, the sort of outfit that clubs around the country will be fielding on Saturday as they try to counter World Cup fever … only Marcus Trescothick and Steve Harmison of the team yesterday would be nailed down as certainties in a first-choice side.”

And he had this to say about the hapless Kabir Ali - 0 for 77 and a first-ball duck:

"If all the pace bowlers were culpable once more, then to Kabir Ali fell the dubious distinction of being the latest scapegoat. Brought into the squad as a replacement for Glen Chapple and then into the XI in place of the hapless Sajid Mahmood, his unexpected appearance and first international bowl in England will surely be his last."

The Times noted that there was a marked lack of atmosphere at Old Trafford where “the resigned mood among those in the stands could not have contrasted more tamely with the suspense of England’s previous visit”.

In the Daily Mail, Chris Foy warned that there is a growing mood of “public indifference”. He continued:

“The booing started just after 11.30am. Being forced to watch the nation’s finest available players being unable to master even the basics, and by the end of Sri Lanka’s innings fielders were jeered fro denying the visitors’ batsmen boundaries.”

In the Mirror, Mike Walters took up a similar theme:

“Ten months ago Lancashire turned away 30,000 for the final day of the Ashes thriller. But last night the queues snaking round Old Trafford were those trying to flee another bankrupt performance.”

The Australian has greeted news that rugby league star Andrew Johns will play for New South Wales in Twenty20 matches next season with less than delight.

“Employing Johns' profile as a rugby league player is a bizarre way of convincing the public that Twenty20 has long-term potential. It does the opposite, confirming Twenty20 is all about gimmicks and short-term novelties that make it only fractionally removed from pick-up games in parks.”

And fast bowler Shaun Tait was another who appeared unimpressed, with a blunt message to Johns:

“You're fair game. If the game's for points then it's hell for leather isn't it? If he is happy to play he has to be happy to take the heat."

The England bowlers may have a fetish for banging the ball in at any given location on the pitch but what is lamentable is the absence of a Plan B, writes Derek Pringle in The Telegraph. The fans might as well fix their eyes on the football.

Instead of balls having 'hurt' written into their path and trajectory, they had 'hit' instead, something Sanath Jayasuriya and Mahela Jayawardene rarely needed a second invitation to do.

If Bangladesh could do it, so can Afghanistan. Their heartening performances in England could hardly be termed an 'upset' and Nick Greenslade explains why they are here to stay. Read on in The Guardian

Unlike football, which was largely driven underground, cricket survived the rule of the Taliban, though it first had to be cleared by the Orwellian Vice and Virtue police, who suspected the game of American associations.

Football is considered 'The Beautiful Game'. Or is it? Mike Haysman questions the veracity of that title, showing where cricket can teach people a lesson or two. Read on in Supercricket.

Controlled aggression is an adage you will often hear bandied about by analysts. The best sportsmen do exactly that, control their pent up anger and deliver the killer blows in a lethal manner.

Post-match press conferences are usually fair routine affairs. Occasionally - when David Gower left one early at Lord's in 1989, for example - something happens out of the ordinary.

But caribbeancricket.com reported that during the 3rd Test, one reporter - Val Thomas from St Kitts-Nevis - tried to use the question-and-answer session to make some fairly cheap points about insularity and favouritism in team selections.

Thomas is a disgrace to the profession. A parochial, narrow-minded individual who decides to be disruptive because it serves his own insular interest.

And Vanesia Baksh, writing on the same site, commented on Thomas, who having asked Daren Ganga about his role in the side, then rudely asked "Who is your godfather", implying that his place wasn't down to merit.

"It was a question designed to embarrass, and it did. It embarrassed the media. It annoyed the WICB's media liaison Imran Khan, and there was a heated exchange. What escaped him as he ranted and raved loudly and interminably while others tried to work, is journalistic professionalism. Moreso, and this is a point that relates to any profession, there is no call to behave obnoxiously to anyone in the line of duty. No profession requires that of its practitioners."

If the Chinese Cricket Association's development plans are even half successful, it is only a matter of decades before the cricket world could be looking at the new giants of the game, The Age reports.

The Chinese Cricket Association is hoping that by the end of 2007 China would have 30,000 players, 600 coaches and 600 umpires. Their target is for 150,000 players by 2020.

The resurgent cricket played by the Sri Lankans during the past month is down to their captain, Mahela Jayawardene, writes Mark Nicholas in The Telegraph.

Writing in The Sunday Telegraph, Steve James says that the ECB is now beginning to have a retink about the spurious nicknames given to county sides in a bid by marketing men to make them more appealing. How many people know who are the Phantoms, Lightning, Dragons, Steelbacks ...

"If you can reel off the counties related to those monikers, please accept my hearty congratulations, even if that anorak does look a little silly. If not, do not fear, because you are not alone in your indifference to such superfluity. Be grateful that the nicknames, introduced in 1999, are rarely listed without their geographical identities. For that is the problem: to do so is too long-winded.

"Even the England and Wales Cricket Board are now beginning to wonder about their viability. An unofficial sounding out of media outlets was made earlier this season and the response was not encouraging. A waste of time was the general consensus."

Cricinfo sticks to using traditional county names - despite terse emails in the early days from county PR men and the ECB - because most readers were bewildered when we briefly adopted the nicknames. Any attempts to persuade people to grow familiar with the names was not been helped when Surrey decided last year to change theirs ...

"The Lions have become the Brown Caps, which at least is nearing their ubiquitous, if mischievous, sobriquet on the county circuit. That is the Brown Hatters, in case you are wondering."

Last week Shane Warne flew to Germany to commentate on Australia's World Cup match against Brazil then captained Hampshire against Durham in the County Championship before flying back to Australia for a check up on his shoulder. Squeezed in amongst all that were endless sponsorship meetings and PR events. Somehow Paul Kimmage managed to squeeze in an interview with him. Read it here in the Sunday Times

“It seems a pretty manic existence,” I suggest.

“It is at the moment,” he agrees. “If my children were here with me, I wouldn’t be committing to so much; I’d be down in the park playing football with them, or frisbee, or on the swings, but they’re not here and keeping myself busy makes the time go faster until I can see them again.”

With talk of player burnout and performance-enhancing drugs, it may not be fair to squarely blame the scheduling. Michael Atherton, in The Telegraph explains why, analysing England's so-called punishing itinerary. He also suggests that drugs could be put to better use, if only..

Given that international players are routinely drug-tested, it would be a foolish player indeed who sought to prove the validity of May's argument. Shane Warne, banned from the last World Cup after failing a drugs test, should know.

As Pakistan arrive in England for a heavy summer of cricket, Scyld Berry warns that the hosts will be up against tough and talented opponents.

	Sachin Tendulkar's comeback, playing for Lashings: the right decision, or merely a bank balance booster? © Will Luke

Sachin Tendulkar began his comeback from shoulder surgery at Fenners - Cambridge University's ground - by scoring a gorgeous 91-ball hundred for the Lashings World XI side in a match against the university. However, not everyone was impressed by his decision to 'ease' himself back into cricket by playing five matches for Lashings.

Far from advancing his rehabilitation, these appearances may set him back, writes Peter Roebuck in The Hindu.

Tom Moody’s tenure as Sri Lanka coach is proving to be a good one. And, says Richard Hobson in The Times, he is shaping up to be a decent future candidate for the role of England coach.

It was a fight till the very end for Budhi Kunderan, the former India wicketkeeper who succumbed to cancer yesterday. Clayton Murzello pays a tribute, with touching quotes from family and Kunderan's friends.Read the full piece in Mid-Day.

"In the age of the Internet, Budhi Kunderan did not give it any space. He used his hands to write letters to his dear ones."

It’s not all glamour being a cricket reporter ploughing your way round the county circuit. The Daily Telegraph’s Charles Randall seemed to have had more than enough of Canterbury, where a combination of some dreadfully dull batting from Kent and a pitch with as much life as a cadaver finally did for him.

“A huge total on an easy-paced strip should impose fatigue and 'scoreboard pressure' on the opposition, though this ponderous exercise at the St Lawrence Ground proved unedifying as neither side gained maximum batting or bowling points.

Kent's cynical effort provided minimal personal development value, minimal entertainment and very little advantage in the table against one of the lowest counties.”

Even though lots of one-day cricket is played in England, the international side isn’t what it could be. But rather than that be a surprise, it’s actually quite understandable, says Mike Selvey in The Guardian.

It's a tough world. The Daily Telegraph in Sydney reports that 22-year-old Daniel Kling has been sentenced to eight years jail for fatally bashing a work colleague on the head with a cricket bat. The two argued and fought at work and their boss sent them home to
"sort their shit out".

"However, after things calmed down, an intoxicated Swain called Andrew Kling a "dickhead" as he left the house, prompting his son to follow him outside. The prosection said after Swain said "let's go" and put his fists up, Kling whacked him across the left side of his head with the bat in a single, heavy blow."

	© The Daily Mail

You have to burrow into the twilight zone of the sports’ pages to find even a passing reference to the 2nd ODI, and almost universally Michael Owen’s knee occupies more column inches than the entire match.

“If there was one place to bury all the Ashes nostalgia for once and for all, then this was surely it,” wrote Colin Bateman in The Daily Express “ and Sri Lanka dug the deepest of holes for England and dumped them in it. You can only live on past glories for so long …”

Even the broadsheets, who normally give England’s international matches their full attention, seem to have had one eye on Cologne. Only Mike Selvey in The Guardian attempted analysis, and he spelt out some home truths about Sajid Mahmood. “There came a point yesterday when even the most hard-hearted spectators must have felt like running on to give him a hug. His was a dismal experience, his bowling stripped bare by a withering, calculated assault from Jayasuriya and Jayawardene at the outset, from which he was never able to recover.”

In The Daily Telegraph, a subdued Derek Pringle noted that "the worst 10-over figures by an England bowler are 10-0-83-0, still held by your correspondent after a mauling from the West Indies in the 1987 World Cup, but they would surely have been exceeded yesterday had Mahmood bowled his allotted 10."

Back to The Guardian where the excellent Lawrence Booth described Kevin Pietersen, who hit 73, as “playing like a millionaire surrounded by paupers”. He added: “Right now, Pietersen's brilliance also highlights England's ineptitude. The trouble is that not even Pietersen, a man so keen to prove his allegiance to his adopted country that he painted the cross of St George on his cheeks before last week's Twenty20 international, can carry the burden for much longer. In fact, he might already be feeling the pressure.”

In The Sun, John Ethridge could take no more. "Familiarity breeds contempt, they say, and there is only so much of this repetitive rubbish we can take. This defeat does nothing to dispel the notion that England have no true strategy with the World Cup only nine months away."

Food for thought for the ICC. An article in The New Yorker, talks about why governing bodies of international sport often turn out so badly. It’s subject is FIFA, football’s kindly ruler which is currently under the media spotlight after various allegations were made by the BBC.

“It rules impartially, concerned only with “the good of the game,” as the organisation likes to say … [but] “the good of the game” seems to get subordinated to the good of FIFA. Why, when global governing bodies have such noble aims, are the results so consistently bad?

“Since Blatter [FIFA’s president] took office, FIFA has channelled tens of millions of dollars in grants to developing countries to promote soccer, while seeming not to pay too much attention to how the money gets spent. Perhaps coincidentally, this tends to make representatives from these countries very grateful, and very unwilling to change the status quo.”

No-one is suggesting that the ICC is anything like FIFA, but it is a warning of how things can go so very awry, even when the original intentions are good.

Michael Clarke’s off-season has involved what the Daily Telegraph called a “bar room scuffle” with a Parramatta rugby league player in Sydney.

Clarke's manager Lisa Stallard yesterday confirmed the pair had been involved in an incident at Northies. "There was a bit of mucking around that got out of hand," she said. "The bouncers weren't happy with it and Tim Smith got the raw end of the stick and got thrown out."

"Not a day goes by at a county ground without someone, be it a player or a coach, a spectator or even a tea lady, asking the same question. 'Why,' they want to know, 'do the England selectors persist in picking Geraint Jones?'"

Gibson believes it comes down to Duncan Fletcher.

"The suspicion is that only Fletcher, the allpowerful coach, knows the answer to that because his colleagues, David Graveney, the chairman, and Geoff Miller watch enough domestic cricket and canvass enough opinions to know that there are many better wicketkeepers than Jones, some of whom can also bat at least as well as he can."

Shane Warne plays his last game for Hampshire before shoulder surgery in Australia. The Press Association says a host of other Australians will also be flying home after the next county match for the Top End Series.

There is a curious feeling of irrelevance marring this one-day series, feels Mike Atherton.

Two unheralded newcomers, Jamie Dalrymple and Tim Bresnan, battle heroically to fill the Flintoff vacuum, writes Stephen Fay

Will Buckley, in the Guardian, raves about Paul Collingwood and says England could use another Collingwood - or five.

Lancashire’s Mal Loye hasn’t given up hope of an England call-up; after all, if his county team-mate Glen Chapple can get one at the age of 32, then there’s always time for Loye, who is just a shade older at 33. He tells Steve James in The Telegraph,
that he will keep fighting.

Mike Selvey recounts the times when a glass of water in death-like humidity was just a mere mirage - with examples from his own playing days, when the curse of the Albatross struck. And they say Europe is getting hot! Read on in The Guardian.

Opening the bowling beneath the ramparts of the old Dutch fort in Galle, in extreme heat, but more pertinently drenching humidity and flat calm, it felt as if I was breathing in flames while simultaneously being hit in the chest with a sledgehammer.

"If you think too much about why I am not scoring runs or what I am doing wrong... then it gets difficult to emerge from the difficult phase," Virender Sehwag tells Chandaresh Narayanan in indiatimes.com

"He [Ganguly] first came to me before the Natwest final in 2002 and said, 'Maybe you will open in Tests. We have openers but they are not performing'. I said, 'Let's finish first with the One-dayers and then we will talk about it.' From then on there was no looking back"

"Former England captain Nasser Hussain recently wrote that cricket is much more professional and multi-dimensional these days. If it indeed is, he would do well to answer the 17 questions raised here," writes Bob Simpson.

India's young brigade has been a little tardy in revealing its talent to the cricketing world but the precocious ability of the players will soon be exposed for all to see and admire, writes Frank Tyson

Kevin Pietersen’s name is being lent to many products at the moment, predictably enough – but he hasn’t even played the new computer game named after him.

And, finds Brian Viner in The Independent, Pietersen has changed within just a year. But is it a surprise?

Superstardom appears to have turned the appealing brashness into arrogance. He has also cultivated that affectation particular to self-absorbed sportsmen, of referring to himself in the third person.

Still, who cares what Pietersen is like when he bats like a god?

	Shane Warne: larger than life © Getty Images

Well well. About a month ago, a 28-foot statue of Shane Warne was transported across London before being unveiled at Piccadilly Circus. Ever alert, the chaps at The Wisden Cricketer sitting a few desks away sent a spy along...but the statue had vanished.

Anyway, turns out that the statue is part of Cricket Australia's advertising for the 2006-07 Ashes which begins in November.

The first instalment of the six advertisements will hit television screens on Sunday night.

In the advertisements, a group of Australian workers take the Warne statue past a series of London landmarks and garner all sorts of reactions from locals.

The campaign, which culminates with the arrival of the Warne statue at Piccadilly Circus, will also be screened in the lead-up to next summer's Ashes series between Australia and England.

A Barmy Army Australian representative has his secret plan for more Ashes tickets exposed in The Age.

"Due to the appalling lack of tickets they have given the lads, we have decided to help them. This way more England lads and a lot fewer dingoes ... It's just one more way of keeping out your loud-mouth Aussie workmate, who you know you really hate so you can give him or her the finger when they say, 'I wish I had a ticket'."

The result may not have gone Ireland’s way, but Irish eyes were positively beaming with the success of hosting England at Stormont, as The Belfast Telegraph records. In particular, the 100,000 Euro profit made will be of great assistance to the game.

Ireland’s coach Adrian Birrell was pleased with his side’s showing against the English.

President of the Caribbean Hotel Association (CHA), Berthia Parle has raised concerns that some of the regional resorts are grossly overstating the number of visitors expected during the World Cup, writes Horace Hines in The Jamaica Observer

"I don't think that everybody is going to get that. Certainly the semi-finals will be great as well as the finals, but I don't believe that everybody is going to see these kinds of numbers - not from overseas. You need to look at the Caribbean people as well. I think you are talking 40,000- 50,000 people maximum for everybody."

For years, one of the main perks of being MCC secretary has been the accomodation at No. 4 Grove End Road, St John’s Wood. Once owned by Sir Gubby Allen, it is reached via a passage that runs by the side of the Middlesex office behind the pavilion.

But The Times reports that the incoming secretary, Keith Bradshaw, won't benefit. The MCC has decided to rent the property out, leaving Bradshaw to find his own place to live.

Jack Bailey, a former secretary, was surprised at the move:

“For the first time I can remember it is not considered necessary for the secretary to be in residence, particularly in view of the uncertain state of the world as it might affect Lord’s day or night. There were times when I was called out for various reasons in the middle of the night.”

Thandi Tshabalala, the young Free State offspinner, displaced Jacques Rudolph in South Africa's squad for two Tests in Sri Lanka this summer. Tshabalala, who regards Muttiah Muralitharan as the best spinner in the world, said he hoped to take in all he could about the craft while in Sri Lanka. Read on about Tshabalala's joy at being called up, and how tough he admitted it was to emulate his spinning idol.

It is ten years since Chris Lewis played the last of his 32 Tests and six since he retired from the county game. The broad smile and lean frame are still there, but so is the enigma. In The Times, Patrick Kidd caught up with a man who feels he was forced out of the game, and who was once labelled by The Sun as "The Prat Without The Hat".

“I could have done better, that’s no great admission. But putting it in perspective, I think of me as a five-year-old kid in Guyana dreaming of playing any sort of cricket and I did better than that. Even just pulling on an England shirt was an achievement.”

	Errol Alcott (left) with Glenn McGrath © Getty Images

The departure of physiotherapist Errol Alcott, the Australian team's unsung hero for 22 years, marks the end of an era. Damien Fleming looks back at the legacy of the man affectionately nicknamed 'Hooter' by the rest. Read the full piece in The Age.

Hooter was all this and more, and it was captured in the way he ran out to check on players who needed medical attention. Waiting for the right moment to start his dash, checking that Channel Nine hadn't gone to an ad break, Hooter would give his well-waxed hair a flick, adjust his black Oakleys and make sure every part of his clothing was neat and tidy.

The debate about England's wicketkeeper refuses to die down. Geraint Jones has failed to produce the goods with the bat in the last nine months and his work behind the stumps still raises questions. Chris Read is the next man in line, should the selectors opt for a change, but a young 19-year-old is rapidly coming up on the outside. Steven Davies, the Worcestershire keeper, has recently hit a career-best 192 and good judges of the game believe he can go all the way. Simon Wilde, in the Sunday Times, has a feature on the young man making big strides.

More injuries and more new faces. Michael Atherton looks at the impact of last year's Ashes celebrations on the 'untried' bunch. Atherton also feels the time is right to hand over the captaincy to Andrew Strauss and save Flintoff from suffering the perils of a prolonged captaincy.Read the full piece in The Telegraph.

The one-day squad features names such as Bresnan, Chapple and Dalrymple which, a few months ago, Duncan Fletcher might have thought to be a London law firm rather than candidates for a World Cup.

In the same paper, Scyld Berry votes for a power-sharing system for England with Strauss taking over the ODI captaincy and Michael 'knee forbidding' Vaughan for Tests.

Steve James is not too thrilled about the revamped format of the 2006 C&G Trophy, leading to more meaningless games and in the process driving away the sponsors. James also lists out some of the top performers this season.Read the full piece in The Telegraph.

So toddle off, if you will, to one of the seven matches today, but please do not expect too much. The two probable conference winners will be in action - Lancashire of the north and Sussex of the south.

Few cricket coaches in this country know anything about finger spin let alone the mysteries of wrist spin as practised by the likes of Murali and Shane Warne. The touchstone of knowledge is the ability to teach. If the knowledge of spin bowling is absent in our coaches who will impart it to the young?

I cannot agree with the modern tendency to crowd our schools’ cricket fixtures with so much limited over cricket.

Ray White, former UCB president, analyses the reasons why spin bowling is a dying art in South Africa.

"We have picked this squad as if we had to play the World Cup next week," says David Graveney, the chairman of selectors.

But David Hopps writes in The Guardian that the worthlessness of England's Four Year Plan is now abundantly clear.

England have repeatedly claimed to be building for the next World Cup. The claim was derided then - the secret, the selectors were told, was to allow a side to evolve gradually- and yesterday the worthlessness of England's Four-Year Plan became abundantly clear. To make mass changes with so many players missing is folly.

Shane Warne has got himself a blog, which will sit on his new site PokerCricket.com. The blog promises to give his thoughts on recent cricket news, gossip from the inner sanctum of cricket dressing rooms and stories from around the poker table. Time will tell…

	Andrew Flintoff practises against Merlyn in the nets at Edgbaston during the second Test against Sri Lanka © Getty Images

Matthew Pryor, son of Henry - inventor of Merlyn, the spin machine which England used to combat Shane Warne (partially successful) and Muttiah Muralitharan (not at all successful) - was at The Rosebowl yesterday for the launch of Shane Warne's new business venture: PokerCricket.

He faced Warne in the nets for the first time, an interesting experience having only faced Warne's mechanical-double in the past. Our own Jenny Thompson was also at the day, and also faced Warne - the success of which we are yet to be privy to, but expect to hear about it on Cricinfo soon.

Warne’s first ball is a gentle leg break, which I mis-time back to him. But he is taking it easy and reacts too late as I come down to his second ball and drive him over his head for four. The third is, predictably, a faster leg break, which I cut to point for a single. The fourth I can see scrambling and hear fizzing with a little pique. It is the zipper but whizzes down the leg side.

The fifth, he sees me coming down the wicket and drifts a leg break outside leg stump, which I defend. The sixth is there to drive; it is juicy, it has got to go, but I must confess to getting underneath it a little. Fortunately, having pushed the field back, it lands safely for one at mid-on. England 1 Australia 0 and an early blow for the Ashes.

More in today's Times

	The MCC Museum © Anthony Devlin

The MCC museum at Lord's has been given the thumbs up from this week's Time Out magazine.

t is the top-placed sports museum in the 'Time Out' review and, overall, it is rated fourth out of the 50 museums featured in the new edition - which is published today (Wednesday 7th June).

Readers of the magazine, the capital's leading leisure and entertainment guide, are encouraged to visit the Museum to see its extraordinary collection of cricket art and artefacts - including the world-renowned Ashes urn and the famous 'stuffed sparrow' from 1936.

The displays in the MCC Museum - the oldest sporting museum in the world - benefit from the fact that Marylebone Cricket Club has been collecting cricket memorabilia for almost 150 years.

More info on this at the official Lord's website.

One of Sport Relief's projects, All Out for India, is to be televised on BBC One tonight and tomorrow and 9pm. The event, involving thirteen celebrities - including Chris Evans and Phil Tufnell - took place in March. More info can be found at their site

In an exclusive interview to Ajay S Shankar of The Indian Express, Greg Chappell reviews his first year at the helm as coach of the Indian team, his relationship with Rahul Dravid, his plans for Sachin Tendulkar, and a note of the praise for the Indian selection committee.

I didn’t expect things to continue going upward the whole time. We were always going to have a few setbacks along the way. Particularly, as this year we have three overseas tours. There are always going to be some tough moments in that period.But in some ways, it might be a blessing in disguise, it has pointed out a few things.

	© The Nation

Haydn Gill in the Barbados Nation lead the way.

“As the replays proved inconclusive, the decision was made in favour of the batsman. Lara appeared to ask for a further review, and when the verdict went against West Indies, he had a few words with Dhoni.”

The Jamaica Gleaner noted that Lara’s behaviour was less than exemplary:

“So upset was the West Indies captain that at one stage he dragged the ball away from the umpire at one end of the pitch before throwing it to the stumps at the other end as play seemed set to resume.”

In the Stabroek News Garth Wattley endorsed the view:

“Lara descended to finger pointing at the umpires, a pointed discussion with Dhoni and partner Mohammad Kaif and lastly, the angry grabbing of the ball from standing umpire Asad Rauf.”

That raised the question of a lack of consistency if, as most people believe, the match referee choses to do nothing against Lara while 24 hours earlier Mahela Jayawardene was fined 20% of his match fee for a moment of frustration with himself rather than any official.

	© The Mail

The best summary of Muralitharan comes in The Guardian, which takes the unusual step of devoting part of its main editorial to praising the man and his wider achievements.

"For a lesson in how to triumph over adversity, the world of sport has provided few finer examples than Sri Lanka's priceless cricketer Muttiah Muralitharan. No player has been more scrutinised and microscopically examined than Murali, nor so carelessly disparaged, the victim of what politicians call spin of different sort. In any other profession, Muralitharan's ability to rise above the disability of an elbow that cannot entirely straighten would have been cause for praise. In cricket, instead, it has brought repeated allegations that his action is illegal, forcing him to undergo repeated biomechanic tests to prove his innocence. Those who care to study the findings of those tests can only accept that what they see is largely the result of an optical illusion."

And those views are echoed elsewhere in the same paper by David Hopps:

"The triumph of Murali has been a triumph of acceptance. The genius once condemned by so many as a blight on the game is now generously acclaimed by the majority as a unique bowler of the age. Where once there was cynicism, now there is admiration; where once there was condemnation, pleasure now reigns."

Geoff Boycott in The Daily Telegraph said England’s problem lay with the bowlers:

“People may wonder how we found it so easy last summer to deal with the Australian tail, especially when the Aussie bowlers had a couple of top players like Adam Gilchrist and Simon Katich to bat around. But the difference was that England were getting the old ball to reverse swing. In this series, they haven't got it reversing at all.”

In The Independent, Angus Fraser rued a series that had started full of hope but which had ended in a defeat:

"That self-belief has slowly been eroded by the helicopter wrist and the subtle variations of Muralitharan. Drawing a home series against Sri Lanka in May and June, in conditions that suit your style of play and are generally alien to your opponents, is extremely disappointing. At full strength England are capable of competing with the best in the world, but the chances of the team that won here in 2005 ever playing together again are now looking very remote."

The tabloids muster little enthusiasm, with their editorial resource at full stretch covering their two obsessions – the World Cup and Big Brother – but after praising Sri Lanka, John Etheridge in The Sun does raise the issue of the pitch:

“The England hierarchy will certainly ask why the Nottinghamshire groundsman prepared a pitch that was tailor-made for Murali. The ball turned sharply and the bounce was so uneven that some deliveries kicked waist-high while others hit footholes and scurried through six inches off the ground."

Mike Walters in The Mirror managed to kill two birds with one stone, working football into his cricket summary:

“On the day Sven's lot flew out to Germany, drawing 1-1 with Sri Lanka - who usually suffer from travel sickness at Colombo airport - was a desperately disappointing way for England's cricketers to sign off, with torrential football forecast for the next month."

The last curmudgeonly word goes to Michael Henderson in The Times. Henderson is a man never frightened to tread where others won’t or to indulge in some pot stirring.

“One man, it is said, cannot make a team, but now and again one man does. Without Diego Maradona, Argentina would not have got beyond the quarter-final stage of the 1986 World Cup. With him they won it, square if not always fair. Yesterday’s fizz-bang events by the Trent confirmed that, without Muttiah Muralitharan, Sri Lanka’s cricketers might struggle to master the owl and the pussycat if they played all week by the light of a silvery moon.”

And if that was not enough to ensure that the article wouldn’t be syndicated throughout Sri Lanka, he poked an ever bigger stick into the hornet’s nest:

“As the ICC has failed to outlaw chuckers, preferring to indulge bowlers with disreputable actions instead of backing those umpires who have shown the gumption to live by their code of honour, “without fear or favour”, there is going to be plenty of dodgy bowling in years to come. Anybody who has watched cricket in the subcontinent will have seen that many youngsters have bowling actions in desperate need of amendment. But if the ICC says, “carry on chucking”, carry on they jolly well will.”

We’ve all heard of mystery spinners, but what about mystery pitches? Residents of the Mallee in Victoria are puzzled by the discovery of a concrete pitch and are hoping to find out more – and they even wonder if there may be others like it, too. Discover more here.

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"Difficult piece to write this, given my unashamed admiration for the man and the fact that, without even a hint of hyperbole, he will always be considered a legend of the county game. But I am worried about Graeme Hick. Worried that a glorious career might be heading for a less-than- glorious ending.

Opinion is divided among opponents as to Hick's current powers. "Nothing like he used to be, much less imposing at the crease," some say; "no different - he's just been caught on some poor pitches," others say. Only Hick himself knows."

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Watching the first three days of the Trent Bridge Test was about as perfect as it could get … sunshine, absorbing cricket and all in a lovely setting. But despite all the money spent on developing the venue, Nottingham’s future as a major centre for Test cricket is not assured after 2011 when its staging agreement with the ECB runs out.

In The Times, Richard Hobson reports that in the ECB’s new world of cash is king, however good the ground and facilities, money is what counts. And Nottingham, being the smallest of the traditional venues, is in a tight spot.

Shane Warne's life is a bit of a gift for scriptwriters everywhere. No surprises, then, that he's about to be given the Broadway treatment. Coming to a theatre near you is Shane Warne: The Musical. More at the Sydney Morning Herald.

V Ramnarayan looks back at the West Indies in their prime, and the joyous impact of cricket on their ever-faithful supporters. Read the full piece in The Indian Express.

To me, the golden period of West Indies cricket was not the era of Lloyd, Richards and the four-man pace battery, but the journey that began with Worrell’s historic tour of Australia with his gallant men, and ended with Kanhai and Sobers (almost) bowing out in style with individual scores of 157 and 150 not out in the Lord’s Test of 1973.

Brett Lee has married Liz Kemp in a quiet ceremony near Fitzroy Falls, outside Sydney. Read all about it.

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"Romantic egalitarians, a tribe to which I belonged in those days (and still do) grieved on Eric's behalf, even if Eric himself never displayed the mildest sign of resentment; and grieved even more for the knowledge that Eric's diminished role seemed to have turned on the toss of a coin."

And there is also an article we have found from The Cricketer in July 1943 about the emerging talents that they were at the time and their early days.

"Umpires, too, have had their problems. Once, when Alec was run out in a match, Eric followed in, but the umpire refused to allow him to bat “again” until Alec was recalled from the pavilion for purposes of comparison."

	'They say he hasn't got a very good technique - that's bullshit he has got a good technique and just because it's different doesn't mean it's not good' © Getty Images

Kevin Pietersen's obscene form this summer has forced Peter Lalor to devote an entire, fascinating article on him in Saturday's The Australian, which includes a number of quotations from Pietersen's former coach Rod Marsh:

Suggestions that Pietersen is a slogger without technique are greeted with scorn by Marsh.

"Not at all, there's nothing unusual about him," he said. "He's not like anyone else - he's better than everyone else. That's the thing that people don't understand.

"They say he hasn't got a very good technique - that's bullshit he has got a good technique and just because it's different doesn't mean it's not good.

"Ricky Ponting is exactly the same. Ponting's technique is different to Sachin Tendulkar, but that doesn't mean to say it's not good. People just don't understand that, people don't understand and didn't want to understand Pietersen until he started making runs."

[...]

"He's a very big bloke, he's a very strong bloke, he's a very fit bloke and grounds are smaller, bats are a bit better and he takes them on and hits them over the top if need be," Marsh said. "He's dangerous. He's very dangerous."

Marsh isn't sure about the Gilchrist comparison.

'History will prove that he's going to be very, very good and whether or not his numbers are as good as Gilly's we'll wait and see," he said.

"He's an outstanding, outstanding talent."

Lalor also gains the opinion of Tony Greig - like Pietersen, a South African who came over to England - who, like Marsh, is excited by the potential Pietersen has. Have a read.

First it was Kerry Packer. Now Alan Stanford. Neil Manthorp analyses Stanford's ambitions in running cricket, like his revolutionary predecessor, starting with the Twenty20 international in Antigua. Read the full piece in Supercricket.

Stanford wants to see what happens to cricketers when they're playing for something real, something that might just affect the rest of their lives. Imagine what R550 000 would mean to Loots Bosman, for instance.

The morning after the first day of Ashes ticket-selling and the papers are full of sob stories from Cricket Australia’s "family". In The Age there is a cartoon about how to prove you're a member and an interview with an English supporter who put his tickets on EBay.

Under the headline Barmy Army's guerilla ticket raid, Peter Lalor analyses the situation for The Australian while Queensland’s The Courier-Mail covered the fiasco in its editorial C’mon CA, c’mon.

In Melbourne the tabloid Herald Sun looks at why the series was not protected by scalping laws and Adelaide’s Advertiser reports of more disappointed fans. The West Australian focused on the the speed of the ticket sales and online scalping.