Creating a stamp for the Ashes may be a bit premature. After all, there's still a Test to play © ESPNcricinfo

Andy Flower may be trying to talk up the importance of the Sydney Test, but try telling the Cricket Philatelic Society that the Ashes series isn’t already over. No more than 24 hours after England retained the urn on Australian soil for the first time in 24 years, the society has already designed a stamp to tribute the historic win at the MCG. The stamp has been approved by England’s Royal Mail, and will be available in post offices in the UK by the first week of January. The stamp that features both the Union Jack and the English flag, and has a message of congratulations to England is about as subtle a celebration of England’s success as Graeme Swann’s sprinkler dance.

Breaking news: Neil Johnson is a yogi ... or is he? ©

In this internet age, there can often be a viral element to newsgathering. This means, of course, that news travels fast, but also that it is much easier for less factually accurate stories to pop up on reputable sites.

Such was the case when a bizarre story that former Zimbabwe allrounder Neil Johnson had been appointed yoga instructor to the touring Indian cricket team mysteriously appeared online. Within hours, it had been picked up by several cricket news sites and even found its way onto the official ICC homepage.

The original story suggested that coach Gary Kirsten had hired Johnson “to get his players supple and as fit as they can be for their grueling [sic] South African sojourn”, and claimed Johnson "was seen doing a few yoga asanas along with the players after India lost the first Test at Centurion". It even went so far as to declare "the Indian team's manager Ranjib Biswal confirmed the appointment of Johnson but refused to let him talk to the media”

While Biswal hastily distanced himself from the erroneous story, the ICC spiked it from their page as soon as the mistake was realised. Intriguingly, the Indian cricket team does in fact already have a yoga instructor on tour: Jim Harrington, an Australian married to a South African and resident in Hout Bay, South Africa, for the past eight years.

“I don’t even do yoga,” a bemused Johnson told ESPNcricinfo, before dissolving into fits of laughter. “If it was the 1st of April, I’d understand this,” added his wife Genie.

This website was not taken in.

He was never known for twinkle-toed elegance on the field, but Dominic Cork is following in the footsteps of other former England cricketers Darren Gough, Mark Ramprakash and Phil Tufnell in signing up for a dancing-themed reality TV show. Cork, 39, who still plays for Hampshire, has been confirmed as a participant in the new season of ‘Dancing on Ice’ on ITV1. The only sportsman in a diverse line-up, Cork will be joined by the likes of former EastEnders actor Sam Attwater, Loose Women host Denise Welch and 90s pop-rap sensation Vanilla Ice. The series starts on January 9, presumably so as not to distract from England’s Ashes campaign which is due to end in Sydney on January 7.

A woman who shares the same name as Shane Warne’s long-suffering ex-wife Simone Callahan has been receiving plenty of undue attention from the tabloid press following news of Warne’s relationship with socialite Liz Hurley. The other Simone Callahan, from Geelong in Victoria, has been mistaken for Warne’s ex in the past and is once again being hounded by journalists from the British and Australian tabloids.

“It seems as though whenever there’s a drama with Warne they’ll contact me and knowing Warne there’s always a drama,” said Callahan.

“The British tabloids are the worst. They’ve called my dad’s house and left messages for my cousin. Dad’s also getting contacted by emails and on Facebook. He loves it; he thinks he might make a few dollars out of it.”

Eoin Morgan has earned a reputation for ice-cool innings under all sorts of pressure on the field for England, but his reaction to an unexpected visitor during a pre-Test dinner with his England team-mates may have dented that aura somewhat. "Mid sentence ordering my dinner tonight..a massive cockroach crawled down my arm and all over my leg!!" tweeted Morgan after the incident. "Filthy nic!!"

"Never seen @Eoin16 [Morgan's twitter name] move so quick," Steven Finn tweeted in return. "Cockroach up the trouser leg tends to do that though. Came dangerously close to me too." Shortly afterwards he added: "Were not eating in that restaurant anymore. Might have crawled up my nose."

Shane Warne has been a making a few headlines of late, but rather than his suggestion that Michael Beer should be called up it’s now his private life that is back in the spotlight. Following News of the World pictures (and video) that apparently show him embracing Liz Hurley, Warne has confirmed his on-off relationship with ex-wife Simone Callahan is off again.

“Sadly and unfortunately, Simone and I split up a while ago, our close friends and family were informed at that time," Warne said in a statement on his website. "It is a private matter so we did not make it public. We remain friends and will continue to be good parents."

Hurley, too, has been responding to the recent pictures on everyone's favourite outlet – Twitter. "For the record, my husband Arun and I separated a few months ago," she wrote. "Our close family and friends were aware of this."

Funny how those two statements sound so similar. Almost as if they were planned, isn’t it? Anyway, wonder what Hurley has made of Beer’s selection.

Lord’s may be the home of cricket but it appears that it is things other than majesty and history that appeal to the modern cricket fan; Hampshire’s Rose Bowl ground has been named the best international venue in an independent online survey of cricket fans commissioned by the England & Wales Cricket Board.

Nottinghamshire’s Trent Bridge ground was named the best domestic venue and second best international venue with Glamorgan’s Swalec Stadium rated third in the annual survey in which nearly 7,000 fans took part nationwide. The Swalec Stadium was rated the second most popular domestic venue with The Rose Bowl finishing third based on online responses from fans who attended a range of domestic Friends Provident t20 and international matches last season. Lord’s came in fifth for both international and domestic fixtures.

Venues were rated across a range of different criteria including ticketing, car parking, stewarding, signage, catering, ground atmosphere and concourse and interval entertainment. Strengths and weaknesses were assessed in four key areas: overall satisfaction, likeliness to re-attend, recommendation and competitive advantage over other sporting venues.

“This research gives all our international and domestic venues a clearer understanding of what matters most to spectators when they attend matches and we send our congratulations to Hampshire, Nottinghamshire and Glamorgan on their strong performances in this year’s survey,” said David Collier, ECB chief executive.

All the talk of Shane Warne making an Ashes comeback has left one man a little offended. Fellow legspinner and commentary legend Richie Benaud might be 80, but Australia are looking for a quality slow bowler with a good cricketing brain.

"The really annoying thing about that is that no one has asked me if I wanted to make a comeback," Benaud said. "I think the answer to that is no, because when I started thinking about it, I tried to get my right arm [up] and it wouldn't come up above my shoulder."

Benaud was in a light-hearted mood at the MCG library, where he was launching an exhibition marking four centuries of cricket in print. But when pressed on whether Australia would be better off with Warne, 41, in the Ashes team, he set the record straight.

"Shane was the greatest legspinner there's ever been," Benaud said, "but if he allowed himself to be pressured into playing he'd be off his head."

Kevin Pietersen has been fined A$239 (about £150) and been given three points on his driver’s licence after being caught speeding in a yellow Lamborghini that had been lent to him by his former Ashes adversary, Shane Warne.

Pietersen was busted by traffic cops during a spin along the Great Ocean Road near Melbourne during a day off from training. He was clocked at 121 kilometres (75 miles) per hour in a 100kph (62 mph) zone, but an England team spokesman confirmed that no disciplinary action would be taken against him.

"Geelong highway police detected by laser a yellow Lamborghini travelling north along the Geelong Ring Road at 121km/h in a 100 zone about 2:35pm on Thursday," a police spokesperson said. "The male driver was in his 30s and was issued with a penalty of A$239 and three demerit points. There were no passengers in the vehicle."

Pietersen had earlier used his Twitter page to post pictures of the scenery on one of the world’s most famous roads. “Stunning beaches on The Great Ocean Rd.. Gorgeous drive!!" he said.

A group of Queensland cricket fans have launched a campaign to lure Shane Warne out of retirement in a bid to save Australia from their first home Ashes series defeat in nearly a quarter of a century.

With the hopes of the Australian public crushed by the team's innings defeat at Adelaide, a Brisbane businessman Ross Heywood has set up a website, bringbackwarne.com, to call for donations to an Ashes "Rescue Fund".

So far the site has raised nearly Aus$4000 since going live on Tuesday morning, although given the six-figure sums that Warne racks in through his range of commentary, poker and endorsement enterprises, they'll need a bit more than that ...

"We'll offer the Rescue Fund to the King of Spin, pleading with him to once again don the baggy green and win us back the Ashes,'' Heywood told the Courier Mail, adding that all contributions would be refunded if the campaign proved unsuccessful.

Warne himself is currently on a flight to London, but England's coach Andy Flower gave a wry response to the notion. "I would assume that is just someone messing around," he said. "Shane Warne has retired from international cricket."

Ian Botham and Ian Chappell resumed their 30-year feud in spectacular fashion during the second Test in Adelaide, when they had to be pulled apart by their respective Sky and Channel Nine colleagues following a dust-up in the car-park at the close of the fourth day’s play.

Despite their regular stints in adjacent commentary boxes, neither man has spoken to the other in three decades, with the root of their feud lying in an incident at the Hilton Hotel during the Centenary Test in Melbourne in 1977, when the then-uncapped Botham claimed to have punched the recently retired Chappell off his bar-stool in response to his disparaging remarks about the English.

On Monday, the two came close to blows once again when, according to the Daily Mail, Chappell muttered something provocative in Botham’s direction, before both men dropped their bags and went for each other’s throats. “They might be aged 55 and 67, but neither of them are the type of people to give an inch in the face of conflict,” said a source at Channel Nine.

However, Chappell defended his position: "There was some words spoken in the car park and I am being painted as the instigator," he told 3AW. "I would accept 50 per cent of the blame but certainly wasn't the instigator and as far as the rest of the rubbish is concerned about having each other by the throat and having to be pulled apart that is one of those fairytales I just talked about."

Ricky Ponting and Andrew Strauss exchanged terse words at the close of the first day’s play at Adelaide, as James Anderson was drawn into the centre of a row over sledging during the final stages of Australia’s first-innings collapse.

Ponting, who is protective of his team-mates and never shy of engaging in some verbals, was seen marching over to Strauss alongside Brad Haddin as the teams left the field after England had faced one over of their first innings before stumps.

The row appeared to centre on an incident during the latter stages of Australia’s innings, during Haddin’s ninth-wicket partnership with Peter Siddle, when Anderson was seen talking to the batsmen and, in the words of one Australian newspaper, “invading their personal space”.

Ponting was understood to be complaining about Strauss's lack of on-field management of a bowler whose shy off-field persona belies the fiery character that he has become. When asked about the incident after stumps, Anderson said knowingly: "I'll go back and ask and tell you later."

Sir Donald Bradman lost a record at the Gabba last week, when Alastair Cook took his highest score at the ground, but another one still lives in the collection of Sir Tim Rice. Rice, the man who provided lyrics to Andrew Lloyd Webber’s music, had lunch with Bradman in Adelaide 30 years ago and they swapped stories about their shared interests.

“He was a talented musician,” Rice said. “He wrote songs as well, but piano was his instrument. I’ve got in my collection a 78rpm record of Sir Donald playing a couple of pieces and it’s great. It was recorded back in 1930.”

Rice, a former president of MCC, is a cricket lover who will deliver the eighth Bradman Oration on Thursday night. The annual speech is designed to keep alive the name of Bradman, who died in 2001. “It’s about linking aspects of music with cricket, and also about how I got into cricket and how much Australia means to me,” Rice said.

When the musical Evita, which was written by Rice, opened in Australia in 1980 he invited Bradman to the opening night. “He didn’t want to come, or couldn’t,” Rice said, “but very graciously invited me to lunch, which was much better.”

Kevin Pietersen has hit out at Damian Hough, the new curator at the Adelaide Oval, after England's first practice session ahead of Friday's second Test was frustrated by bad weather.

With unseasonal rain restricting the players to indoor practice and cautious warming-up sessions on the outfield, Pietersen wrote on Twitter: “What should a groundsmen [sic] make sure he does 2days out from a test match???? Cover the nets when it rains maybe???” He later followed up with: "PATHETIC!"

According to eye-witnesses, Pietersen also vented his frustration in person at Hough, who took over at the Adelaide Oval this year, following the 32-year reign of the ground's previous curator, Les Burdett.

Pietersen is no stranger to Twitter controversy. Back in September, he was fined by the ECB after inadvertently revealing the fact that he had been dropped from England's one-day squad against Pakistan. In a hastily deleted message, he declared the decision a "****-up", and also revealed that he was about to join Surrey on a short-term loan deal.

Fittingly, Hough's actions were defended in a separate tweet on behalf of SACA from Cricket Australia's general manager, Peter Young, who wrote: "SACA has put out a statement re rain 2day, 1st priority was to protect Test track, practice wix [wickets] then covered, normal practice 2moro."

Hough, who unveiled his first Test wicket on Tuesday afternoon, has promised a "traditional Adelaide wicket".