The Surfer

Warne is a god to many Australians, who may not take kindly to their hero being mocked on home turf. The obvious next move for Perfect and his cast would be a UK transfer, but if he wants to cling on to the lead himself I'd guess they'll need some good stunt casting in the supporting roles to pull in the punters. I'd recommend casting Hugh Jackman (long overdue a West End return) as Warne's Hampshire team-mate and good chum Kevin Pietersen, Jennifer Ellison as Warne's ex-wife Simone, and perhaps John Barrowman as England's triumphant captain during the 2005 Ashes series, Michael Vaughan

“I grew up on a tobacco farm in Zimbabwe,” he said. “The first time I walked into the England dressing room was the first time I’d spent a day in the company of all those guys. I didn’t know anyone really. I did feel like a foreigner in the dressing room.

If you stop investment into anything, then it will die. The PCB needs to invest at the grass roots level, ex-players should play a big part in going to small towns to hold camps and scout for talent. Why am I getting offers to work with spinners in England despite not having any formal coaching qualifications? There are lots of qualified coaches in England that could do the job, why ask me? It's because experience counts for something. The PCB need to learn from that and start to tap into the wealth of experience that they have in Pakistan in the form of all our talented ex-players.

The BCCI has played out to be the perfect stage, hosting such an emphatic display of yet another comedy of errors. The whole saga of moving on from the debacle in Sri Lanka has given birth to a host of questions, all reeking of confusion in the ranks of the Board ahead of the most important Test series in some time for Indian cricket. Of course, no answers are forthcoming, as always!

In 1993, the 21-year-old Hayden was picked for Australia's tour party to England on the back of a couple of excellent Sheffield Shield seasons. He was travelling for the experience but on that tour he played 13 first-class county matches (ah, those were the days...), scored 1,150 runs at an average of 57.55 and yet DID NOT PLAY AN ASHES TEST FOR ANOTHER EIGHT YEARS

Kevin Pietersen must tell his quick bowlers to go after Virender Sehwag, who so often gets India off to a flier. Sehwag scores fast and lifts the whole spirit of the team when he is firing. England have to get up his nose. Don’t try to bounce him out, because Indian pitches give batsmen more time to play the hook shot, but get the ball into his ribs. Get him tucked up and in a tangle. The key is to deny him the room to play shots.

After the euphoria of 2007 and the club’s first piece of silverware, it was always going to be hard to live up to the expectations, some of it optimistic, of its supporters in 2008. Yet that is precisely what Durham did, by winning their maiden county championship title, just 16 years after gaining first-class status.

A week spent watching the denouement of the LV County Championship at Trent Bridge last week highlighted the issue. There were four spinners on view, bowling on a pitch that, while slow, was bare and dry. There were two left-armers (Samit Patel and Liam Dawson), an off spinner (Graeme Swann) and a leg spinner (Imran Tahir): three home-produced players and one from overseas; three orthodox spinners and one with more “mystery”. Between them, the home-grown spinners took four wickets and Tahir took eight.