India-Australia Tests, or the Stanford Super Series?

The fortnight we are amid features an enormously important cricket match. At the risk of sounding oracular, we don't know which one, writes Gideon Haigh in the Guardian. It could be the Test that finished last week in Mohali, where not just the wheels but the axles, transmission and beverage holders fell off Australia. Or it could be the climax on Saturday of the Stanford Super Series, where every misfield will have an impact on the Antiguan balance of payments. It will not, however, be both.

So far, the response of administrators has been to recite cliches from long-ago commerce and business degrees. Cricket, they insist, is splendidly positioned, with all these interesting varieties, each appealing to a different demographic. Because, you see, transport companies that prospered a century ago spread their investment evenly between automobiles, landaus and velocipedes, while the airlines that did well 50 years ago maintained an interest in Montgolfier balloons and Bleriot monoplanes as well as jumbo jets. Well, now you put it that way ...