The Surfer

He thought Australia went on the defensive very quickly and points out how a deep point appeared almost inevitably after an aggressive shot. There was a hint of that during the Ashes series as well and it raises an interesting issue about teams like Australia that win, if not all, at least most of the time. Just as teams that don’t win often enough find themselves lost when victory is sighted, teams that win all the time can find themselves searching for ideas when a relatively new situation presents itself. It has long been my view that Australia are awesome when they are front runners, a great and often elusive quality in itself, but get a bit confused when they fall behind.

Then came the Ashes, a victory that made every player feel like a superstar. MBEs were handed out as if they were sweets at a primary school and Andrew Flintoff was named as the BBC's Sports Personality of the Year. In the aftermath, the players saw an opportunity to capitalise on their success and make loads of money. Appearances were made here, endorsements signed there and suddenly the focus turned outward. The complete overreaction of the English media and everyone associated with English cricket probably led some players to believe that a lifetime's work had been completed. So the starting point of the slide was the focus of the team.

Five down and here we go again. Yet England don't always bow to the inevitable, either. And it was a new, fresh face that arrested the decline. Tim Ambrose came out and played without paranoia, as he did for Sussex, as he does for Warwickshire. He had the effrontery to hit Oram for two boundaries, doubling the number the big man has conceded in the series. The pitch was sleeping again. Was Vettori right to bowl? What's a good score? Er ... I'll tell you in two or three days' time.

"It was when he was young, and speed was everything, and he'd just come in and try and knock blokes' heads off,” Mott said. “It wasn't a hell of a lot of fun to face him. And he's obviously a lot more accomplished bowler now than he was then." The match will be Lee’s first Pura Cup final.

Next Monday the ICC board will gather in Dubai for a meeting that represents a genuine fork in the road. The formal agenda looks as sterile as the air-conditioned tower block from which cricket is now notionally ruled, but the issues could not be more incendiary. Zimbabwe, the future of the World Cup, the international calendar, the Indian Twenty20 leagues and the appointment of a new chief executive are all due to be discussed. After a decade of mismanagement, amid unprecedented commercial and political pressures and with its members increasingly placing narrow self-interest over the collective good, we are about to discover whether the ICC is still capable of governing the game.

Please note, the Proteas could be No1 in the world by Friday lunchtime, not necessarily the best in the world. Not until they can convincingly beat the Aussies at home, defeat England in the one-dayers later this year and take care of India, the hottest team in the world right now, can they be considered the “best”. Nevertheless, we should enjoy our team’s progress while it lasts.

In 2001, as the consultant of the Karnataka State Cricket Association, I had introduced the system of Talent Resource Development Wing (TRDW). The success of this concept made the then President of the BCCI Jagmohan Dalmiya form a Talent Resource Development Wing for unearthing the talent in India. The job description of the TRDOs was to assess the talent in a prescribed form and feed the data into specially developed software for it to get analysed. The talent-assessment system of the TRDW convinced the selectors that there was enough talent to choose from. Today the majority of players who are in the Indian team are the product of the TRDW.

The most relevant aspects about the banning of ICL players are only starting to surface now. Tim May, the chief executive of FICA, the International Players' Association, got it spot on during the week in an article published by Cricinfo. May made it clear that "FICA and its player associations will defend the right of players to seek employment without fear of unreasonable restraint of trade, discrimination and the collusion of a number of bodies to monopolise employment and restrict movement in the market".

Stuart Broad coming in for Steve Harmison who fails a medical examination: his heart appears to be missing. Broad will be cited for verbal abuse at some point as well, despite being something of a babyface.