The Surfer

Rubel Hossain says that had he not played cricket for Bangladesh, he would be working in some Dubai construction company, most likely repairing toilets. The 21-year-old pacer is the son of a fisherman from the coastal district of Bagerhat, which is anything but a cricketing hotspot.But the notion of cricketing hotspots in Bangladesh might be a thing of the past.

England cannot take too much comfort from this win. They are still nowhere near producing 100 overs of consistent cricket. This was a victory that was cobbled together from bits and pieces contributed by Wright, Tredwell, Swann, Ravi Bopara and Trott. It is conspicuous that only the last of them would have been considered a likely member of the XI when England first flew out to India.

England live to fight another day. They lack adventure with the bat and explosion with the ball and cling on to situations through fitness, unity and a deep reservoir of resolve.

Facing Murali never gets easy, especially on his home track. He's a handful on most grounds around the world but on a subcontinent pitch he's just that much harder to face.The guys will obviously see him as a major threat tonight and treat him with that respect going into the game. As a batsman you've just to make sure you have got a well sorted out game plan when you face him and bat with confidence.

The sight of an unknown and diminutive teenager going by the name of Hiral Patel smacking the cream of Australian fast bowling around Chinnaswamy Stadium was bad enough.Yet Australia's speedsters kept dropping short. Patel cut a six over cover and still they banged the ball down. He clouted another six over backward square and still they pitched short.

Of course, rather than stewing in his juices, Ponting should be counting his blessings that he has been given a final chance to end his reign in style. Yet, rather than putting his heart into ensuring a glorious end to his long incumbency, Ponting is wearing it on his sleeve. Railing against the seeming inevitability of his fate.

I don't think you can blame tiredness after a long winter away for England's shortcomings. We are talking about professional cricketers, playing at the highest level, but the end product has been very disappointing because they are a much better side than has been apparent up to now.

In the departures lounge at Nagpur airport last Sunday I stumbled into a thick, swirling crowd of men with their mobile phones out, filming and snapping pictures, as well as brandishing pens and pieces of scrap paper. In the middle of this throng, I found once I had fought my way through it, were Simon Doull and Pommie Mbangwa.

The 1990s were difficult, but Mr. Tendulkar bloomed in that decade. The beauty of sport is that even though it is in the realm of entertainment, it is also an indisputable reality. And Mr. Tendulkar became a rare Indian reality that did not depress Indians. In an impoverished, chaotic nation, he swiftly became the most reliable agent of mass euphoria.

Any particular shot during the 281 you will never forget?
The inside-out shot I hit off Shane Warne through the covers in the post lunch session of Day Four was very special because he was bowling round the wicket into the rough. We all know Warne's quality, so to play that kind of a shot gave me heaps of satisfaction.

It’s hard enough to do battle on the field, but the boards have introduced a great foe: boredom. Between them, the England players may well have downloaded the entire iTunes music library, exhausted their Dongles, thumbed Lance Armstrong’s autobiography to a dirty, messy pulp and clocked up 743,000 hours of PlayStation time.

Bowling for us was a chap called Hamish Anthony, an Antiguan of dubious ability to be a high-class overseas player, but of no little pace. He bowled a decent good-length ball on about middle and off stumps. It should have been defended back down the pitch. Instead the little fellow was up on his toes on the back foot and punching the ball, with an impossibly high elbow and no follow through, back past Anthony for four. Standing in the gully, I gasped audibly.