For a man who wasn't deemed good enough to make the one-day outfit in the World Cup, Alastair Cook has surprised many with his outstanding ODI form in the home season. The Independent's Stephen Brenkley leads the praise for the England ODI captain.

It has not only been the weight of runs but the pace at which they have come. The critics have been scattered to the four winds where Cook now appears capable of hitting his strokes.

It is not always a comfortable sight and it is never elegant. But Cook somehow is forcing himself to adapt, playing shots down the ground and clearing the front leg to whip it to cow corner. Instead of carrying Yorick's skull he has a water-spraying carnation.

In the Daily Telegraph Simon Hughes says it seems extraordinary now that there were doubts whether Cook was suited to opening in ODIs.

Previously typecasting him as a stolid batsman, we should have known what team director Andy Flower and batting coach Graham Gooch had already realised, that the best players can adapt their game to suit any format and that the resourceful and totally focused Cook would find a way.

And he has. Despite not getting much of the strike initially on Tuesday, he kept up with Craig Kieswetter’s scoring rate.

The Falkland Islands were granted affiliate member status by the ICC on June 29, along with Cameroon, Peru and Swaziland. They are currently on tour to England. Matthew Pryor gives an account of their current tour and cricketing history in The Times.

The Falklands have been busy trying to raise their game. As part of that and in celebration of 25 years since the end of the Falklands conflict – and because they cannot really tour Argentina – they are in the middle of a whirlwind tour to England, with seven games in eight days.

They are not intending to make their debut at the World Cup any time soon and played Outwood CC, near Gatwick, yesterday. It meant that Outwood, a small village in Surrey, have scored a unique double, having played (and been soundly thrashed by) Argentina when they were touring England in 1979.

The Gloucestershire Gipsies XI await at Lord Vesty’s ground at Stowell Park tomorrow, before a game for the history books against Falkland CC in Newbury, Berkshire. The name of the Falkland Islands derives from the British expedition in 1690 funded by the Fifth Viscount Falkland, an Admiralty commissioner.