The Surfer

Cricket's governors adopted a somewhat haughty tone on learning Jamaican police had concluded Pakistani coach Bob Woolmer was not murdered, but died of natural causes. The death had resulted in the game being unnecessarily tarnished by bizarre theories of match-fixing, said Lord Condon, of the International Cricket Council's anti-corruption unit. This may have been so. But Lord Condon might ponder why people were so ready to put the worst-possible construction on Woolmer's death, and what that says about the state of cricket.

I used to go to The Oval in the 1970s and 1980s and there were massed ranks of fans, banging tin cans and beating rhythms out, there for the love of the game and pride in the West Indies. We loved it, as second generation immigrants. We didn't quite fit in here, we put up with a lot of racism, and here was our team, coming over and stuffing England. I grew up with parents who called Trinidad home; maybe young black people now don't feel that same affinity.

Ever the candid captain, he said he didn't think he would make the next World Cup, adding that if new coach Peter Moores wants to groom only those who will be around, he might well have to step down. It appears, on the face of it, to be a selfless gesture, but in the same breath Vaughan slips in that splitting the captaincy has never worked, the subtext being that he should continue to lead England in both forms of the game despite his and the team's moderate record in the one-day field.

I was one of the few who saw Bob lying in his room and it was very upsetting. We had become close as captain and coach over the three years he had spent with the Pakistan team. We were already very down and depressed after losing to Ireland. We knew we had let our country down and that we would be leaving the World Cup. Then to go through all that we did, with police interviews and with the world's media after us, it was very, very tough. As I said, they were the hardest days I have known.

In a sad way, the confusion around Woolmer's death is almost a representation of what's wrong with West Indies cricket at the moment. While the Test team finally showed some heart in the third Test against England this week, recent scorecards have been abysmal. Clearly, when it comes to all matters cricket, there is much work the West Indies must do on and off the field to repair their reputation.

Following a shambolic World Cup, a FICA survey of leading players from most major cricket countries found that 56 per cent lacked confidence in the ICC to govern the game. Mali's complete lack of understanding of the serious issues facing cricket will do nothing to reduce that perception.

The idea that youngsters are playing basketball and baseball ... you know, Richie Benaud started that rumour some time ago and I'd like to stand up and put it to rest.

It's a myth. And if you look at the American basketball scene, can you name me two West Indian players?

Baseball, we know nothing about baseball. Soccer, yes. Over the last 15 years lots of soccer players have come to play in England. If someone said to me that soccer is the reason for West Indian cricket falling so low I might think about it. But the real problem, ladies and gentlemen, and it is a problem for sport around the world, is television.

Vaughan is back at the top of his game, both as a batsman and as a captain who wants to crush under-foot these callow West Indians as if they were a displeasing insect. Ruthlessness he wishes to be his hallmark, and he can acquire even more of it if he sticks to the Test-match captaincy, and thereby conceals his vulnerability in the game's more frenetic versions - and 20-over cricket is about to proliferate in the coming months.

Harmison was all over the place. It was so bad as to go beyond criticism; one could only pity. It was like the shift from viewing one's relative as irritatingly cantankerous to hearing the tragic diagnosis of dementia.