The Surfer

“One day he would ask only for left-arm spinners and get them to bowl over the wicket. The next day they would bowl around the wicket to him, and he would do the same,” says Zubin Bharucha, technical director, Rajasthan Royals. “Rahul, being Rahul, wanted to experiment with everything. He would ask for outswing bowlers one day, then bowlers who would bowl slower ones from the back of their hand, and so on.”

To most Americans, cricket is a puzzlement. Even savvy sports fans know little more than it’s traditionally played in white trousers, involves a flat wooden bat and lots of running back and forth. Fewer still realize it has a rich tradition in the United States; it predates by 140 years the national pastime of baseball, which is cricket’s direct descendant.

In 2000, when I read that the Taliban regime was going to promote cricket, I thought it was totally surreal that a tyranny would introduce cricket into Afghanistan without any knowledge of a game that encourages and nurtures individuality, confidence, courage, defiance, within the democracy of cricket. The Taliban had banned every form of entertainment from music to movies, from clapping to chess. Then, out of the blue, the tyrannical regime announces cricket can be played. That Taliban announcement was the genesis of the idea, I played around with it, trying to figure the story.

He does not yet have the earnest authority of Strauss, the self-assurance of Michael Vaughan or the cunning ability to manipulate the subject matter of Nasser Hussain. He is co-operative, eager to please, but sometimes a little nervous. Yet this picture of apparent fragility is utterly misleading.

Camped on the back foot, nurdling and squirting runs square of the wicket on either side, he has made a handsome living out of scoring ugly runs. Because of his back-foot preference, he looks instantly vulnerable to the fullish ball that swings in towards the stumps. But England were hampered by a cold wind and the ball largely refused to swing.

Though the overt stake is much reviled, it is the covert system of riches on offer which is eating into the vitals of the system of Indian cricket. Apart from the hypocrisy of honorary jobs and non-profit character of different associations, the IPL has also brought a massive corrupting penumbra into the system which is not being acknowledged by most.

But West Indies’ real problem is Darren Sammy. As captain he may have been a cohesive force but as a player he does not have serious Test credentials. His bowling is innocuous, hovering around the 75 mph mark, and offers too many scoring opportunities. His honest dobbers are only marginally better than Jonathan Trott’s

The truth is that Bell had a bit of a stinker last winter, making just one half-century in five Tests. But he was hardly alone in his struggles. And there was credit in the bank. Boy, was there credit in the bank. His final Test innings of last summer was 235 against India at the Oval. He made four other centuries during the calendar year of 2011, in which he averaged 118.75. Quite simply he was then the best batsman in the world.

Michael Vaughan, the former England captain, put forward another, far more unconventional, on the BBC radio commentary. It was for the team bus to stop through Leicester on its way north to Nottingham for the second Test that starts Friday and pick up Sarwan.

It won't happen, of course. Even if the West Indies were minded to ask him to return, it is doubtful whether he would for he remains resentful of the way he has been treated by the present dispensation.

Srinivasan was the eldest of two boys and two girls born to T.S. Narayanaswami—a mathematics major who jointly set up India Cements with S.N.N. Sankaralinga Iyer. The latter’s family, which divested its entire stake in India Cements by 2007, runs the Chennai-based Sanmar Group, with interests in shipping, metals and speciality chemicals. As an engineering student in the 1960s at Madras University, Srinivasan played cricket, hockey and tennis. But he figured he should stick to his books.

Cricket will reach its agreements with T20, and years from now people will recall its first quaint decade and smile at how old and proper it all looks. A few sages, cryogenically preserved, will be able to say they saw Chris Gayle bat, this format's Grace, this format's Bradman. WG would certainly approve of how little he says, and of how little he runs.