The Surfer

Some time tomorrow England's cricketers will belly-flop across the line to complete their final match of the southern summer. After which, pre-devastated by a month of the usual 50-over disintegration, they will head on towards the World Cup: frazzled, held together by surgical splints and seized with the usual sense of looming event-panic. Things were supposed to be different this time. The two Andys, Strauss and Flower, were supposed to have scoured away the stench of ancient 50-over confusion. But these things obviously run deep and, looking again at that compellingly sensible squad of players, dusting off the freshly crayoned swooshes and exclamation marks, it has all started to look oddly familiar. Here comes the World Cup: and here come the same old guys.

Gambling is rife, rigged matches are not unknown, brown paper bags smooth the path of building contracts. The corruption of the CWG in New Delhi has been exposed. Let the CWC come next. After that the IPL and ICL need to publish their documents.

Misbah scored 9, 76 not out, 77 and 58 not out in the two drawn tests against the South Africans. Put those together with his New Zealand test return and Misbah has hit 451 runs at 112.75.

The ECB’s latest error is the seven-match abomination in Australia, which allows the England players a three-night break at home between their Ashes tour and the World Cup. Three nights at home between October and April, and jet-lagged ones at that.

All, weirdly, is not lost. By piling up 333 against an attack in which Australia’s big three seamers – Brett Lee, Shaun Tait and Mitchell Johnson – produced the combined figures of 25-1-168-4 – England at least answered some questions about a batting line-up that had been curiously frail in three of the previous five games.

As hangovers go, this is a bad one. England look shot. Spent. Burnt out. They have a thick layer of grey fuzz on their tongue, and their bloodshot eyes seem to be sitting above deep, saggy bags of pallid flesh.

The first thing for Styris to learn is that, by going on Twitter, he is the media. That's why it is called the social media. So if we are the problem, then he is the problem. Secondly, we get an insight into Ryder's personality. He appears self-centred, moody, impulsive and immature. Some of these traits may indeed help his cricket career, others may not.

For me, and this is what really gets me going, Jesse’s tweets were nothing that he, or a lot of other players, wouldn't have said in a post match interview or press conference. His comments should have been ‘part’ of the story, ‘part’ of the days play round up that the original article also did. Jesse’s tweets should not have been ‘the’ story with the game fitted around. He was pissed at how he was run out, that’s ok isn’t it?

The fan asks for nothing more than a good match – and an India-England tie had the potential to be just that in the World Cup – but whether it was the arrogance of the president of the Cricket Association of Bengal or his stupidity that has denied them this, it is not good for either Kolkata or India, or indeed cricket.

A World Cup win is about leaving a legacy; an imprint. Other wins matter but this one could decide so many things. I don't want youngsters to take up cricket because IPL is lucrative but because of the pride attached in representing the country.

Not only was the Ashes campaign undermined by this decision but the World Cup campaign might start on the wrong foot. For that matter the career of a fine batsman has been put in peril. From start to finish it was wrong. Of course, this is hindsight. At the time, emotions were running the show.

But there is a lesson to learn. Sometimes the brave and the stubborn need to be protected from themselves. That is the role of elders.