The Surfer

Sport is a weapon against terror; a weapon on the side of the ordinary, the amusing, the trivial. That is not to deny, still less to trivialise the devastation caused by the terrorists, rather, it is to put them in perspective. There are wicked people in the world, but there are also people prepared to graft out 123 runs in a day's cricket. Sport can't defeat terrorism unaided, but it can certainly celebrate the truth that terrorism doesn't create anything but terror. So three cheers for the England cricket team, and three more for the India team; I hope they both win. But then they already have.

But here we could see shadows of Flower in the batting of Andrew Strauss. Flower, the batsman, tormented even the best spinners with his variety of sweeps. At Chepauk Strauss dutifully followed in his coach's footsteps. Strauss swept hard, he swept gently, he swept in front of square and behind. He swept Harbhajan Singh and he swept Amit Mishra. And when he didn't sweep he nurdled the ball in the same direction. Flower has been pining for hundreds — as batting coaches do — and Strauss obliged.

Three matches, three rounds of golf, three rounds of three minutes, three sets, three days, three acts, none of it works, none of it is complete. Three matches whet the appetite. Too much depends on the first result because the losers are under immediate pressure. Three is better than two, which is not that hard, and otherwise is entirely unsatisfactory.

Test cricket needs to wake up. Night matches, cheaper tickets, faster over rates, fewer silly delays and so forth have parts to play in the revival. But in the end there is nothing to beat a five-match series between two strong sides. Cricket needs to stage proper Test series. The rest is negotiable.

During England's abandonment of their tour and the subsequent regrouping, Moores has been more or less overlooked. The talking has been done by Pietersen or Hugh Morris, the managing director of England cricket who has been earning his corn and showing his colours for the first time. In these circumstances, Moores has faded into the background and if the team continues to lose he might recede further than that. Do not, however, underestimate his strength of purpose, or his ability to forge a bond with Pietersen.

New Zealand didn’t want to face all four quicks, so they selected two spinners in their twelve, and then called in a third...the Windies dropped Andy Roberts and selected spinner Derek Parry, whom Lance Cairns sent over the boundary three times with luscious plundering.

Those kinds of mind games can work - the same as leaving documents detailing the Black Caps’ weaknesses at the Cake Tin, the great finesse of John Buchanan in 2000. Make the other team concentrate on weaknesses and you have won the battle, no?

It was Bedi who fanned the flames. On the second evening of the first Test match in Delhi, a change of ball had seen India's first innings plummet from a healthy 43 for no wicket to 49 for four as the replacement, from Lever's very first delivery, swung alarmingly. Lever went on to take seven wickets in the innings, 10 in the match and England won by an innings. England, meaning Lever, had been using Vaseline all along to help shine the ball, alleged Bedi, including at Delhi, a preposterous notion given the way the first delivery with the second ball swung so far down the legside from the line Lever had been ploughing for five fruitless overs, that it almost missed the return crease. "It is disgusting," said the beleaguered skipper," that England should stoop so low."

The most tempting thing in the aftermath of terrorism is to exaggerate the danger and the effects on daily life. After all, if you want to drive into Lord's the day before a Test match, you have to let the sniffer dogs do their bit there as well. As it happened, I didn't have my pass on the day I arrived here, but I managed to walk through the gates of the M.A. Chidambaram Stadium and out to the middle without anybody asking to see it. The chief sports writer from the Daily Mirror (and you know it's a big story when the “chiefs” arrive) got in by showing his FA Cup pass.

The third day of the Test, which has traditionally been known as Ladies Day, will now be called Jane McGrath Day and McGrath said he was "blown away'' by the support for the foundation. "It will be amazing to walk out there and see everything is pink and I am not sure how I will feel on that first day of play,” he said. “Jane would have been so proud.”

Can anyone answer why there is not a peep from the "in-the-know" quarters about Rogers? You know, the left-hander playing for Victoria who will take the field against Western Australia at the MCG on Monday as the most productive Sheffield Shield opener in the land.