Australian cricket fans and followers would have heaved a sigh of relief (certainly the coach and captain did!) as Andrew Symonds was named in the squad for the Gabba test against New Zealand. Is it an indicator of how uncertain Australia's selectors are that they've announced a squad for only the first test of a two test series? In any case, my main concern is about whether the commentator (onJagadishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07945971736885159644noreply@blogger.com0

With the score standing 9-7 to Australia in the first 16 weeks of our Ashes Heroes series, it's time to give another Englishman a go. This time, it's a fast-medium bowler with one of the most astounding records ever seen.... Patrick Kidd

While I'm away, the blogger Nightwatchgirl offers her second list of Ashes heroes. This time, she has gone for cricketers who were not born in the country they represented. Oddly, Freddie Brown, the second-most famous Peruvian immigrant to England after... Patrick Kidd

Watching England in one-day internationals away from home is rarely easy but, after two heavy defeats in Rajkot and Indore, the next five games and the long hours spent between games on the train are starting to look tougher by the day.

But away from the cricket itself the first week of England's epic odyssey across the length and breadth of India has thrown up the usual array of the fantastic that tend to become the norm on a tour of this amazing country.

Take my TWO TV appearances for instance...

The first was relatively straightforward. The man from BBC News was so stunned that I had decided to follow KP's troops across the subcontinent in the delights of Indian Railways' Sleeper Class that he came down to film me at Ahmedabad railway station en route from Rajkot to Indore.

Taking a simple snap in India still often draws a sizable crowd so you can imagine the interest that was caused by a TV camera pointing at an Englishman slouched on some baggage destined for a faraway location!

My second appearance was far stranger and completely unexpected.

After a knock at my hotel door the night before England's opening game I was about to open up and tell the chai boy I didn't want another cup of his delicious tea when in burst five Rajkot police officers accompanied by a TV crew!

The hotel manager was with them apologising profusely and explained that they were searching all the rooms in the hotel.

I never got to the bottom of what they were searching for but whilst the entire contents of my rucksack were ignored my Dad's 60th birthday card enjoyed specific attention! What viewers would have made of a senior police inspector opening and closing the card to show an elephant playing a shot with a cricket bat goodness only knows!

Whilst the interest, or more importantly lack of, in India's Test series with Australia has been well documented this definitely hasn't been the case in this ODI Series so far.

In both Rajkot and Indore, and now in Kanpur, hotel beds right across the price spectrum have been increasingly tough to come by.

With many of the venues slated for this tour rarely seeing international cricket fans from all over the respective states have flooded to the cities to completely fill hotels that are already very busy coping with the start of India's traditional wedding season.

As the manager of my hotel in Indore succinctly put it: 'I wish the city suffered from cricket fever more often'!

Interest in the games hasn't stopped at the lack of hotel rooms of course.

Both games so far have been complete sell-outs with 32,000 packing into Indore's fantastic Maharani Usharaje Trust Cricket Ground and, supposedly, 18,000 squeezing into Rajkot's slightly less salubrious Madhavrao Scindia Cricket Ground.

Even in an empty ground the view afforded in Rajkot isn't what one would expect from an international cricket venue.

The bamboo canes and ropes used to hold up the temporary awnings combined with the permanent barbed wire topped metal fence make watching the cricket difficult enough.

But when you add a crowd who have cleverly adopted the 'one-person-out, four-people-in' technique during the first session of play to swell the actual attendance way above 20,000 then watching much of the game becomes virtually impossible.

Mind you, when you lose by a whopping 158 runs maybe that's no bad thing!

Right. I need some help. Over the past 12 months or so, the phrase “he’s in a good place” has sprung up like a particularly virilent form of hospital super bug and it’s resisting every fathomable disinfectment. It’s everywhere. Steve Harmison has been described as “in a good place” ever since he returned to the England side, and now Andrew Symonds has also joined him in this happy sphere of goodness. Form counts for nothing these days, despite what Peter Moores bangs on about (”yeah. He’s looking a million dollars in the nets”). It’s all about how happy they are; whether they’re in their special, good place.

Where is it, and how do you gain entry? Answers on a postcard, or ideally in the comments below.

Google has teamed up with LIFE to unveil an incredible amount of photography (free). Obviously, I did the honourable thing by searching for any cricket photos, and there are a few interesting ones. It’s by no means as comprehensive as Hulton or Getty Images, but I enjoyed this photo of cricket being played in Germany in 1942. You’d imagine they were British, but who knows?

And here are C. Aubrey Smith (R), Henry Stephenson (C) and Boris Karloff (L) in 1948, taken by the brilliantly named Loomis Dean:

The real gems lie in their historical coverage. Search for London blitz and you’ll find rare beauties like these:

So, anyway. Have a look and enjoy wasting hours and hours.

At the press conference before the start of the second ODI against India, Paul Collingwood, England's skipper until a few months ago, laid out England's plans of world domination competing in the one-dayers against India. Get the tall big fast bowlers to bounce out the puny Indians. Get early wickets. Put pressure on the inexperienced middle order.The 'inexperienced' middle order that he refersJagadishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07945971736885159644noreply@blogger.com2

On the way to the cinema today, the tube was held at Green Park where the driver made an announcement. “Look, ladies and gentlemen, sorry to do this to you, but this needs to be said.” Amazingly, everyone halted their introspection to listen. The driver named and shamed the woman in the third carriage who had dived through the doors at the previous stop, while they were closing, and left her toddler standing a couple of feet from the train as it shot down the tunnel. “Careless and irresponsible” was the driver’s verdict. It’s hard to disagree.

Alan Tyers (or Alany as he prefers to be known) has hacked into Kevin Pietersen’s inbox and found his diary. What secrets does he have for us?

Some of the boys went to the market to see if they could pick up any local handicrafts (DVDs, knock-off iPods, etc). Harmison said he didn’t want to go because it might be dangerous, or noisy, or even both, and also what if he needed to do toilet? But Flintoff said he was going and Harmison then said: “I love markets, they’re great.”

So I told Flintoff and Harmison not to get up to any mischief and sent Sidebottom along with them. I try and pair up the sensible ones with the not so reliable lads in a sort of mentoring programme. Cook has done wonders with Belly, for instance. Belly now gets his own cereal in the morning and eats it quietly even if the little plastic toy has already been taken by someone else. We’re growing together as a group.

Alec Stewart is not the sniping type, but this must count as one of the vaguest, faintest forms of praise in many a year.

Collingwood, with respect, is a poor man’s Mark Ealham

Ouch! And meoww. “With respect” ranks alongside “to be fair” as one of those phrases which means decidedly less than nothing. It’s a minus-phrase, but not as bad as “I’m not a racist, but…”

Still, he’s a got a point has the Gaffer. Colly is having an unadulterated Barry at the moment.

I'm out of the country for the rest of the week so blogging will be next to non-existent, but our regular features have been knocked up in advance so there is plenty of cause for visiting while I'm gone, not... Patrick Kidd

God, I think I love Bill Lawry. Just listen to this collection of blinkered, one-eyed, completely OTT commentary. He is an inspiration to someone, somewhere, and let’s hope he gives birth to a new generation of ridiculously enthusiastic commentators. Take it away, Bill, you ruddy bluddy legend.

The video is here if you can’t see it above.

“Season after season, cricket fans turn on their radios and television sets and settle in for another summer of humiliation. It will be a minor miracle if the pattern does not begin again on Thursday when the Black Caps walk on to the Gabba.”

The Dominion Post on the masochism of New Zealand’s cricket fans, via the Beige Brigade.

For the past few days, the Cricket Australia website's "Cricket cares" section has been updated with a list of (17 so far) mustachioed personalities of Australian cricket, including Greg Dyer, John Buchanan, etc. I'm sure the likes of the Chappell brothers, David Boon & Merv Hughes will end up somewhere near the top of the list. Perhaps there could even be a spot for Adam Hollioake, given he wasJagadishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07945971736885159644noreply@blogger.com0

A considered, accurate, and bloody good piece by David Hopps at The Guardian on the problems facing cricket’s media. You might think that the likes of us (Cricinfo) and newspapers are nothing more than freeloading loafers with inflated egos and an unhealthy appetite for free lunches. You’d be right for the most part, too, but this particular industry is in a state of flux.

CricInfo has endured this treatment for years. One of the most popular websites in the world is persistently refused accreditation by the BCCI because it does not fit in with their grand design. It has learned to scramble for accreditation where it can. Established newspapers, who feared CricInfo’s pioneering of free internet cricket news as much as the BCCI did, were not about to run to help. Had they done so, sports journalism in the independent, mainstream media might not be facing the threat that it is today.

Dozens of sports journalists were laid off at the end of the summer. Some were from the nationals, who have been covering cricket for two decades or more. Others were from regional newspapers who quite often have a cricket desk of one person. Quite what these people will do next year is anyone’s guess, but it’s a worrying time for cricket journalism as a whole.

As you’ll know, Reuters refused to cover Australia’s tour of Australia, and there were more difficulties with contractual terms in regard to Getty Images. And a few days ago, Reuters boycotted New Zealand’s tour of Australia. BCCI and Cricket Australia - and others in the future? - want editorial control over the photographs taken. They want to know who is using them and for what purpose. For the BCCI, they simply can’t cope with the idea that, for example, Cricinfo has been online since 1996 yet they only launched their website a few weeks ago. We had nearly three million people watch the last Test between India and Australia, and none of them had to pay.  Apart from Australians. They had to pay in self respect.

So, public - watch out. These greedy boards are soiling themselves about the internet like it’s 1990 all over again, and instead of working with it, they’re fighting it. Dangerous times for all.

I think it can be said with reasonable certainty now that Australia’s era of global dominance has come to an end. They will still be very difficult to beat, but that aura of invincibility has disappeared in a puff of smoke. But which country is best-placed to begin world domination, the type which Australia achieved for 13 straight years, and West Indies before them? Let’s have a look:

Australia: rich in batting; a recession in bowling. Plenty of quality cricketers but no Warnes or McGraths to be seen. Domestic competition remains strong, but less so than in previous generations.

Bangladesh: talented minnows, an occasional rising star. World domination unlikely in the next 20 years. Reliant on Asian bloc for support.

England: solid if unspectacular batting talent but better-than-average stocks of fast bowling. Loads of money and ambitious if greedy board. Domestic competitions now world class.

India: financial powerhouse allied with supreme talent makes for a juicy cocktail. Domestic tournaments strong. Very strong youth cricket. Fast bowling stocks as good as they’ve ever been. Batting traditionally strong. Politically the most powerful, but increasingly autocratic.

New Zealand: over-reliant on flexible characters and cricketers (ref: Vettori). Still impressively competitive considering the puddle of resources to choose from, but currently suffering a recession of genuine talent.

South Africa: nothing much changes. Fast bowling is promising on paper but inconsistent on the pitch. They continue to lose far too many outstanding players to England’s counties, and are politically unstable. Always challenging on the pitch and strong in youth cricket, but not a contender for world domination.

Pakistan: an absolute goldmine of natural talent, most of it untapped or unrefined. A crying shame they play such little Test cricket. Their board are about as clued up as a cauliflower, sadly. Fast bowling stocks are always impressive, if the contenders occasionally contentious…

Sri Lanka: they have everything apart from fast bowlers and money. Batting is ridiculously strong, and they’re a sick prospect at home but will always struggle abroad. I have more money under my mattress than their board. Will continue to lose players to India’s leagues.

West Indies: no amount of Stanford’s dollars will rekindle the cricket love. Facilities dreadful. No sponsorship for their domestic tournament this year suggests that the decline is still in freefall. When Chanderpaul, Gayle and Sarwan depart, who will step up? One of modern sport’s greatest losses.

So, the only three I can see are Australia, England or India. Of those three, England’s pace-bowling future is probably the most healthy but India aren’t far behind and their batting is frighteningly good. England have a number of young, exciting fast bowlers - but we’ve said that for years and some have fallen by the wayside. As ever, the key to world domination lies with bowlers: so who will take up the mantle over the coming decade?

My money is on India, but there remains a danger that they’ll burn themselves out and/or lose a lot of friends politically. 

Discuss!

I received a flurry (well, two) emails from someone in India accusing me of racism. This is a weekly event for me, not one I particularly cherish or relish in anticipation, but for once I thought I’d respond. I’ve not posted anything about India’s win over England because I didn’t watch it. If that makes me racist, bigoted or in any way xenophonic, I’d like to take this opportunity to apologise on behalf of the millions of other Britons who couldn’t be arsed to wake themselves up at 3am to watch a predictable drubbing.

My prediction: India will win the first three, then England will storm back to win a couple, the eventual score being 4-3 to India.

Uh oh. Tony’s stirred up a million hornets nests with this:

“These Pakistanis don’t know how to do anything other than argue. They never stop arguing. They are always right. And I have got to say I’ve almost had enough of it.”
Tony Greig vents after Rana Naved-ul-Hasan and Abdul Razzaq get into a shouting match during the first ICL final

Regular readers will know of my interest in satire, and of Andy Zaltzman and John Oliver’s podcast at The Times. Happily, after contacting Andy, I managed to persuade him to write for us, so you can now enjoy his blog at Cricinfo.