How do you manage a leggie in Asia?

One of the more futile things I ever did as a Premier League skipper was sit down our pro, Imran Tahir, at a sticky brown pub table with two 20p pieces and 11 filter tips, sliding the latter hither and thither in precisely arranged constellations as we talked through various scenarios, batsmen and fields.

It was futile in two main ways: first, we were playing on such scruffy pitches that even someone as dangerous as Nathan Astle was forced into desperate defence against deliveries that spat like sausage fat from the pockmarked surface; and second, Immy simply didn't bowl to any kind of pattern. He was too steeped in Lahori tape-ball cricket to resist the temptation of running through his repertoire most overs. Not that him bowling three wrong'uns an over to a 6-3 field particularly mattered in club cricket, of course, although his skipper at Titans, Martin van Jaarsveld, eventually grew irate, militantly removing him from the attack if he overdid things.

Not too many England skippers down the years have had to reckon with the joys of setting a field to legspin bowling. However, with the four surviving members of that exotic species - Robin Hobbs, Ian Salisbury, Chris Schofield and Scott Borthwick: 25 Tests, bagging 36 wickets at over 60 - having been joined by a fifth in Adil Rashid, it will be fascinating to see how he's handled by Alastair Cook, who hasn't exactly been overwhelmed with praise for his tactical acumen since he assumed the England captaincy in September 2012. That said, he appears to be improving, overcoming his innate bloody-mindedness, lack of captaincy experience and long exposure to the ideological asceticism of the andocracy. Observing Brendon McCullum at close quarters this summer has been the former Bedford School choirboy's gap year trip to Thailand: suddenly, he's aware of a new way of living, different possibilities for perceiving the world, the infinite permutations of arranging troops in the field.

Of course, you can tell a lot about a captain from the way he sets his field for spinners - not only the arrangements he ends up with, an index of his adventurism or conservatism, but also the manner in which he does it, the authority and sense of certainty he exudes, the overt or implicit challenge he lays down to the batsman (occasionally verbalised), even the occupation of the batsman's space. The medium is the message.

Occasionally in India, and perhaps counter-intuitively on turning pitches, Warne would bowl to a 4-5 field, using drift to pitch outside leg stump to wristmeisters, bowling to their (high-risk) strengths

SK Warne - an anagram of which encapsulates what most batsmen think of top leggies - may with each passing commentary stint be slowly discrediting the dogma about him being the Best Captain Australia Never Had, but ball in hand he was undeniably masterful in mano a mano skirmishes, spotting a batsman's flaws, using the angles, narrating the battle, working them over, grinding them down. Perceptive, imaginative, theatrical.

How to set a field for leggies in Asia? Occasionally in India, and perhaps counter-intuitively on turning pitches, Warne would bowl to a 4-5 field, using his trademark drift to pitch outside leg stump (possibly into footmarks) to wristmeisters unafraid to flick through midwicket against the spin, bowling to their (high-risk) strengths, playing a game of angles.

Talking of which, as a poker player Warne would also appreciate that you could bowl a googly from wide of the crease without so big a "tell" on line. (Jason Gillespie once thought he'd worked out Murali on the basis of where he pitched it: wide, it was the big offie, straight, the doosra. "Then he went around the wicket and I was absolutely stuffed!") The field was: a wide slip, because of the angle after pitching; a backward point for the defensive run-off; a straight extra cover; and a mid-off. On the other side was a mid-on, midwicket, short leg, 45 man and deep-backward square. Given that a spinner always lacks one fielder in the game of cat and mouse, Warne was essentially saying: you can have cover point, mate.

It will be intriguing to see how Yasir Shah is used when he regains fitness, and it will be equally fascinating to see how two leggies with much more to prove, Rashid and Tahir, fare when expected to provide a cutting edge without scoreboard pressure rather than second-guess batsmen compelled to attack. It's Immy's last chance to salvage a Test reputation languishing far behind the impact he's had in white-ball cricket, although I don't suppose he'll be sat with Gary Kirsten and Hashim Amla sliding filter tips around a table. Technology has moved on.

In the summer of 2012, desperate to have my old mate do himself justice in Tests, I buttonholed Kirsten - an anagram of which name is what Immy endured in Adelaide later that year - round the back of the pavilion at Derby. Briefly, before he called security, I suggested that a bowler whose legbreak is nothing special but whose wrong'un is arguably the best in world cricket should, in order to make that stock ball (and, thus, the variations) more potent, perhaps try bowling wider on the crease so that, rather than landing in line and angling away toward slip (previously, a frustrated looking Graeme Smith), thus opening up the off side, the ball should pitch and threaten the stumps.

Hitting the pads is clearly a good idea in the DRS era - or rather, in India, the era of post-Hawk-Eye umpiring consciousness, where ball-tracking feedback affects their decisions and, by extension, shot selection (the sweep off the stumps is less prevalent nowadays), which in turn affects field placings, with the once automatic deep- backward square leg often brought up into the circle. Perhaps this modus operandi is no bad idea for Rashid, too, a bowler widely considered on the slow side to worry batsmen when they are not forced to play shots: work the angles, bowl at middle and leg. Modulated attack.

Warne, no fan of Cook's captaincy, advises novice spinners and their captains at the beginning of spells to "attack with the ball, defend with the field". Cook need not subscribe to the fetish of aggression. There's no need for dogmatic adherence to head-on attack. As the great battlefield generals know, you can be assertive or decisive in retreat. Besides, with two spinners and four seamers, he clearly has some latitude in the cat-and-mouse battle: unlike the Swann-plus-three era and its non-negotiable economy rates, a calculated assault on Rashid is less likely to throw his long-term management of bowling resources into disarray.

Either way, Test cricket is about to get more interesting. Whether that proves a headache for Cook remains to be seen.