Strauss wrecks England selection policy

The first time Ricky Ponting took a break from the Australia captaincy he was publicly censured by Steve Waugh, his predecessor. “The Australia captain is the benchmark of resilience and mental toughness,” Waugh said, and ought to be seen to be “almost indestructible”, writes Mike Atherton in the Times.

When asked before the Johannesburg Test last week what were the secrets to his early success as captain, Strauss talked of removing what he thought previously to be a “top heavy” style of leadership. Strauss’s England, we are led to believe, is a happy commune, where the most junior man’s thoughts carry equal weight to the captain’s and where the leader’s actions are not to be divorced from the rest.

No doubt, though, the junior mess were not asked what they thought of their captain pulling rank and missing what is known on the circuit to be least glamorous and most arduous of tours.