The ballad of Murali and Barry

Jul 16, 2007: Racism and jealousy: does it really matter which comes first

When averages strike out

Jul 8, 2007: Strike rates tell us how often a bowler achieves his aim; averages tell us the price he has to pay for every success

The beauty of ugly

Jul 4, 2007: Chanderpaul seems oblivious to it all, disdainful of such niceties, and, crucially, wholly un-self-conscious

Of necessary evils

Jul 1, 2007: All today’s antics achieved, for this less than dispassionate observer, was to underline why this town ain’t big enough for two necessary evils.

Double the fun

Jun 27, 2007: If the almighty US cultural dollar is valued as much as it seems to be, they could always go the whole hog and trim XIs to Xs and have nine alternate innings per side a la baseball, each expiring with the fall of a wicket

Why Twenty20 vision is impaired

Jun 24, 2007: Much as I’d love to see such games played over two innings per side – cricket without second chances is like a BLT sandwich without the B - I have few quibbles with the philosophy or the format

Saluting the equivocal Englishmen

Jun 22, 2007: One is generally regarded as a byword for nerdiness and prima donnaesque truculence, the other as the flat-track bully who couldn’t stop Australians kicking sand in his face, the underachievers’ underachiever

The man who should have been king

Jun 21, 2007: Adam Hollioake led a star-deprived, profoundly maverick but one-for-all XI to victory in the 1997-98 Champions Trophy, the only one-day pot England have won in a tournament featuring more than three sides

From Stan to Ollie

Jun 20, 2007: The first time I saw him bat for England, I saw Stan Laurel in him,­ the same rebellious tufts of hair, the same vaguely bemused expression, the same understated command of his craft

The Bob Marley Test

Jun 19, 2007: Cricket with an uninspiring West Indies is akin to soccer blighted by a charmless, defensive-minded Brazil – a sport incapable of fulfilling its potential

The downside of heroism

Jun 18, 2007: Had it not been for the torpor and ennui instigated by May and Cowdrey in 1957, it is tempting to wonder whether the clamour for the limited-overs revolution would have been so fervent

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