Alastair Cook fell early, but the job he so often does for England was performed ably by Jonathan Trott and Nick Compton

Andrew McGlashan in Wellington14-Mar-2013The road surface on the proposed flyover next to the Basin Reserve, which is causing much consternation among those worried about its impact on the ground, will not be much flatter than the 22 yards in the middle were made to look by Nick Compton and Jonathan Trott.You could not have found a more polar opposite performance to the first innings in Dunedin, where England donated wickets as though making a delivery to a charity shop. Amends were made in the second innings and that head-down, don’t-give-it-away, attitude was transferred to Wellington.England’s top three embody that philosophy to batting. They are all renowned for substance over style. Alastair Cook’s dismissal was a shock because he does not chip catches to mid-on in a Test match, but any concern that the captain’s early departure would destabilise the top order was widely misplaced.That will have satisfied Andy Flower immensely because after Dunedin, he said some other members of the top order had to take the lead, rather than leaving it to Cook to repeatedly set the tone. There was a sense of inevitably about Trott’s hundred, but at the other end there was the continued evolution of a batsman who has a similarly single-minded approach, if without quite the same compulsive mannerisms.When Compton walked to the crease, he was a batsman with a Test hundred to his name and it showed. He did not suddenly become a dashing, thrilling strokemaker – at one stage during the afternoon it took him 77 balls to add 14 – but there was an ease at the crease created by the confidence of his achievement in Dunedin.There were two pulls during the opening session that had an air of authority about them and a cover drive that purred off the bat. When his tempo slowed during the middle session Compton did not fret; he had been there many times in his first-class career. A fierce square drive behind point, with a flourishing follow through, took him to 96 and an even better shot, a rasping cover drive, brought up the hundred which sparked more emotional celebrations. This time there was a greater sense of enjoyment rather than relief.Trott, though, did not sense any sudden change in Compton’s approach. “You can never go into a Test match relaxed, you are always quite nervous especially at the start of your career,” he said. “You don’t want to take things for granted. But I certainly think he will take a lot of confidence out of it, knowing he can score runs at this level, because you are never really quite sure until you score your first hundred. Maybe he felt more confident, don’t think it’s a case of being relaxed.”It took Trott 12 innings to double his hundred tally following his debut ton against Australia at The Oval. Back-to-back hundreds, regardless of conditions, are a considerable feat of concentration and refocusing. A cautionary note, though. The previous player to follow his debut ton with another in the next innings was Ravi Bopara in 2009. Nothing is ever guaranteed for the future.At times in the County Championship last season, Compton will have faced tougher conditions than the Basin provided. New Zealand’s bowlers, whose thoughts about Brendon McCullum’s decision to bowl may have become more unprintable as the day progressed, were honest but limited. With an in-form top order themselves, especially after Hamish Rutherford’s debut performance, it should really have been them batting. Without the encouragement of at least semi-regular breakthroughs, those 170 overs in the field four days ago will have been felt in the legs.It was the opposite effect for Compton, whose energies will have risen as New Zealand’s dipped. After Compton’s maiden hundred, Cook was asked whether it will help relax his opening partner – renowned for an intense approach to the game – and Cook’s reply was telling. He said he hoped it wouldn’t, that the intensity to Compton’s game was what drove his hunger to succeed.”That is the art in cricket, finding the balance between intensity of wanting it too much or being a bit too relaxed,” Trott said. “I think his balance at the moment is really good. He has a good work ethic so he fits right into this team.”The only occasions Compton was made slightly uncomfortable was during a testing spell by Tim Southee, who almost found the glove with a brace of well-directed bouncers over leg stump. When the short deliveries were around chest height, Compton had few concerns, but the hook did not seem such a natural stroke as the pull and fast bowlers around the world are unlikely to be slow to test him. In a mark of the innings, though, two balls after being beaten for the second time he stood tall and drove a boundary square.Maybe Compton was not intense enough after reaching the hundred because he drove loosely to edge Bruce Martin to slip. International sport does not allow someone to be content with success for too long. There was the opportunity for something even more substantial if he had managed to start his innings again.After driving the last ball of the day for two, Trott, as he always does, remarked his guard before walking off. New Zealand managed to dislodge one century-maker, but there is another with his eye on plenty more runs. “As a batsman you have never scored enough, you never think you’ve done the job,” he said. Compton may just be pondering that thought, too.

That and other fiendishly difficult questions in this special England-India preview quiz

Andy Zaltzman25-Feb-2013Greetings, Confectionery Stallers. As a preview before the salivatingly anticipated first England v India Test at Lord’s, here is a multiple-choice quiz for you. No conferring. No looking up the answers on the internet. No hacking into my telephone, computer or brain to see if you can gain an unfair advantage on other readers.Question 1: Who is going to win the England v India series?(a) England. When the ICC Reliance player rankings for both teams are totted up, England have an advantage in batting (mostly arising from Sehwag’s absence), and bowling (mostly through Anderson’s superiority over Sreesanth/Praveen). They have not lost a series for two and a half years, and have in Cook a batsman in form so prime you could griddle it and serve it as a steak in a Michelin-starred restaurant. They are confident, settled, in form with bat and ball, and ambitious.(b) India. Lord’s looks set to be rudely rained on, and – brace yourselves, stats fans ‒ India have not lost anything other than the first Test in a series in England since being unceremoniously splattered like a catapulted tomato on a granite snooker table in 1974. India have not been overwhelmingly impressive in Tests in the last year, but they are tough. They won two tight Tests against Australia, recovered from a first-Test flambéing by South Africa to draw an away series, and won in West Indies without several first-choice players. They won a World Cup under unprecedented pressure of expectation. They won here in 2007. They have lost only one of their last 10 Tests against England, and only three of their last 30 against anyone.(c) No one. It’s going to be a draw. They are both very good but not flawless teams, and both are hard to beat. Besides, it is going to rain solidly for the next six weeks. It will be snowing by the time of the Oval Test. It’s the end of the world, I tell you. Alastair Cook turning into the world’s most unstoppable batsmen is one of the cast-iron signs of the apocalypse. It’s in the Book of Revelations. If you read it backwards after a couple of bottles of whisky.(d) Cricket. Six of the world’s current top-11-ranked bowlers against six of the top 13 batsmen (once Sehwag is fixed). Legendary batsmen against the world’s best bowling attack. India’s best-ever team against perhaps England’s strongest in decades. It could be magnificent. As long as the captains don’t just meet on Thursday morning and decide to call it a draw at the toss.(e) Technology. The continuing search for the perfect version of the DRS is being conducted with the scientific ruthlessness of a blind lion at a supermarket checkout trying to find the barcode on a zebra. The latest scheme is to remove one of the bits that seemed to working the best, and replace it with other bits that no one seems quite about. It’s crazy, but it might just work. Although more likely it won’t work, and the lion will soon enough poke his scanner at another part of the increasingly irritable zebra.Question 2: Who should England pick: Broad, or Bresnan?(a) Broad. He turned the 2009 Ashes single-handedly in England’s favour, and his selfless injury in the 2010-11 series opened the door for the fire-breathing renaissance of Tremlett. He has a dreamy cover-drive.(b) Bresnan. He took 11 wickets at 19 in the Ashes. Broad has taken 10 wickets at 55 in five Tests since the start of the Ashes. Bresnan has taken at least four wickets in each of four of his last five Tests. Broad has done so in two of his last 13. Admittedly Bresnan does not have a dreamy cover drive.(c) Both. It is a tough selectorial call, but it can be avoided by making the two allrounders play jointly, dressed in a pantomime horse outfit. This solution, whilst contrary to the usual Flower-Strauss era game plan of not picking two players in a pantomime horse outfit, remains more likely to be adopted than dropping a batsman and playing five bowlers. (They could alternatively play in a pantomime Ian Botham outfit. Whichever is more readily available in the MCC costume shop.)Question 3: How much will India miss Virender Sehwag until he returns from injury?(a) A huge amount. India will miss Sehwag like a picnic would miss gravity. He scores more runs, faster, than any other opening batsman in history – averaging 55 off 66 balls when he has gone in first for India. He is a certifiable immortal of the game with previously inconceivable statistics.(b) A small amount. He struggled against the moving ball in South Africa, and has not scored a Test run in England for nine years. Largely through lack of opportunity, admittedly.(c) Not at all. He makes absolutely no difference to the side. In Sehwag’s 86 Tests, India have won 35 (40%), and lost 19 (22%). In the 21 Tests he has not played in that time ‒ when he has been omitted either through injury or because the selectors ate a poisoned mushroom and convinced themselves that he was not nearly as good at hitting cricket balls with cricket bats as Dinesh Karthik or Wasim Jaffer (neither of whom, it must be said, currently averages 55 off 66 balls each time he has opened in Tests) ‒ India have won eight (38%), and lost four (19%). So India win, draw and lose an almost identical proportion of games whether the Delhi Dazzler is playing or not. The same applies to Tendulkar – India have won 34% and lost 26% of the Mumbai Mathematical Mammoth’s 177 Tests. In the 17 games he has missed since his debut (albeit without the selectors ever tucking into the mushrooms and deciding he was not as good as Dinesh Karthik or Wasim Jaffer), they have won 35% and lost 24%. All of which suggests that the result of a Test match is completely unaffected by the players playing in it, and the Indian selectors might as well pick Bollywood starlets, random names out of the phone book, or Dinesh Karthik and Wasim Jaffer. You cannot argue with statistics.Question 4: How significant is the 2000th Test milestone?(a) It is the greatest moment in the history of cricket, and therefore, by logical extension, the greatest moment in the history of civilisation. When Dave Gregory and Jim Lillywhite marched out to toss the coin at the MCG in 1877, it is fair to assume neither said to the other: “This is going to be the first of at least 2000 Test matches.” Shakespeare only wrote 38 plays, but people still witter on about him all the time, almost 400 years after he popped his drama-obsessed clogs. Test cricket therefore has proved itself at least 52 times better than Shakespeare, and the moment deserves to be celebrated accordingly.(b) It is nice.(c) It is irrelevant. The currency of the Test match has been devalued like a Zimbabwean dollar, with too many featureless series, inadequate teams, and the idiotic Australia versus Half-Hearted World XI being inanely and pointlessly upgraded from “a bit of a jolly” status to Test match status. If you keep scheduling lots of Test matches, mathematics suggests that you will pass mathematical milestones for how many Test matches have been played. The greater concern is: will there be a 3000th? And if so, will anyone know what you are talking about when you say: “Hey, folks, it’s the 3000th Test match today”? Or will you have to explain: “It’s like two really, really long games of Twenty20 joined together. Still no? Bit like football but with sticks and no goals?”Question 5: Does the fact that Sachin Tendulkar has thus far scored fewer Lord’s Test centuries than Ajit Agarkar mean that the latter is a greater batsman than the former could ever dream of being?(a) Yes. You cannot argue with statistics.(b) No. You can and should argue with statistics. And you should keep arguing with them until they back down and start talking some sense.(c) Too early to say. We should not rush to judgement on such matters. Let us wait until both players have retired and then judge their batsmanship careers objectively.You have eight seconds to complete your answers. If you get all five correct, you win your choice of Yuvraj Singh or Kevin Pietersen to keep (subject to availability). Enjoy the game. And if you are a rain cloud reading this and thinking of heading to Lord’s to see what all the fuss is about, please stay away and follow the match on TV.EXTRASThe news in Britain has been dominated by a murky swamp of subterfuge, falsehoods and half-truths of late, so the occasional incontrovertible fact is a source of both solace and excitement. Sachin Tendulkar has had a long career. That is a fact. He is only the fifth man to play Tests in four separate decades. And only the second to have done so without having played before the First World War. And the first to have done so without being English.Tendulkar played his first Lord’s Test 21 years ago, against an England team containing moustachioed offspinster Eddie Hemmings, who had made his first-class debut in 1966, when Wilfred Rhodes was still alive and well and with a few more years in the tank. Rhodes made his Test debut in WG Grace’s final international match in 1899, and went on to become the only man in the history of civilisation to play Test cricket in five different decades. Could that be Tendulkar’s next challenge once he has notched up his 100th international hundred? To equal, and then surpass, Rhodes’ Most Different Decades Played In Test record? He looks in good enough shape. He probably does not have much else in the diary for the next two decades that cannot be put off until the 2030s. He might as well give it a go.

From Ashok Sridharan, United Arab Emirates

Cricinfo25-Feb-2013
Vinod Kambli: the Archie Jackson to Tendulkar’s Bradman?•Getty ImagesI was checking in at the Mumbai airport recently when I saw a familiar face at the neighbouring counter. At first I thought I recognised him, but I wasn’t so sure since no one else was. He quietly checked in and started walking towards the security check when I mustered the courage to walk up to the man and talk to him. As it happened, my eyes weren’t deceiving me. It was indeed Vinod Kambli. The man with two double-centuries and a Test average of over 50, the man who played his last Test at the tender age of 23 was standing right before my eyes!He was delighted hear me recount that match in Sharjah eons ago when he took Shane Warne to the cleaners and still more so when I asked him for his autograph. It was in many ways a poignant moment. Here was a man no one around seemed to know or recognise (or perhaps care to acknowledge) and yet, this very same person could have been one of the all-time greats.There was a time when he was bracketed along with Sachin Tendulkar as one of the most promising young players in world cricket. For the pre-teen boy that I was back then, the flamboyant and self-assured Kambli was far more attractive to watch than the more sober Tendulkar. Today, nearly two decades later, Sachin Tendulkar is widely acknowledged as one of the all-time greats.Vinod Kambli is a name that is no more than a footnote- the Archie Jackson to Tendulkar’s Bradman. Kambli was a man with extraordinary talent who never quite made it big – India’s very own Hick, except he was dropped at 23 and never again given a shot at redemption. As many people of my age would concur, life in reality turned out to be an awful lot different from what we imagined it to be in our teenage years/early 20s. I met at the Mumbai airport that day, the very embodiment of that harsh reality.

Plays of the Day from the fourth day of the second Test between Zimbabwe and Bangladesh

Firdose Moonda in Harare28-Apr-2013Dismissal of the day
Mushfiqur Rahim was well on his way to a third Test century and would have been furious with the way he did not get there. Hamilton Masakadza was brought on to bowl some innocuous medium pace, which should not have troubled Mushfiqur much. He tried to guide a shortish delivery to third man but was surprised by a hint of extra bounce and got a thick edge instead. Vusi Sibanda, at point, flew to his right and latched on to the chance. Sibanda had put down a couple in this match but pulled of a blinder to deny Mushfiqur a hundred and take the first wicket of the morning.Shot of the day
Sohag Gazi brought out his trademark big hit again. Once an innings, he launches one of the bowlers into the stands in display of isolated aggression. This time it was against Hamilton Masakadza. Gazi charged him to loft a delivery on the half volley over long-on. The ball hit the roof of the media area to jolt the journalists awake after what had been a fairly quiet morning session.Delay of the day
When Bangladesh’s ninth wicket fell, 45 minutes into the day’s second session, it seemed they had every reason to end their innings. They led by 388 runs and history was heavily slanted towards them. The highest successful run chase in Harare is the 192 for 7, achieved by Pakistan in 1998. The highest fourth innings score is 310, notched up by Zimbabwe in 2002. Still, Bangladesh were not going to call it quits until they had set Zimbabwe a target above 400. So the waiting continued, for another 15 minutes until they have achieved their goal, which gave them four-and-a-half sessions to bowl Zimbabwe out.Wicket of the day
Ziaur Rahman had minimal impact on the match until he bowled the delivery that could prove decisive to Bangladesh’s cause. After an uneventful first spell, he was brought back on from the far end and got one to angle in from a good length. It struck Taylor on the back pad, in front of off stump. A long, loud appeal followed but Ian Gould would not have needed that much convincing. Rahman picked up his first Test wicket and it was the big one – Taylor scored almost as many runs as the entire Bangladesh line-up in the first Test and would have been the one man thought capable of saving this one.Tactic of the day
The need to protect the best batsmen as the day is drawing to a close often calls for use of the nightwatchman. But to have him walk out with an hour of play remaining could be considered premature. Still, Zimbabwe decided it would suit them better to ask Shingi Masakadza to bat the day out with his brother Hamilton rather than risk Elton Chigumbura or Richmond Mutumbami. Perhaps they thought the family connection would help and, in the end, it proved a good decision.

Watch highlights from the third day of the Lord’s Test.

20-Jul-2013Watch highlights of the second day of the 2nd Investec Ashes Test from Lord’s here on ESPNcricinfo.To see higlights from the previous days, please click on the relevant day:Day 1, Day 2

1st session

2nd session

3rd session

For 11 and half sessions before that interval, Zimbabwe had done most things right, but they let the game slip away in 8.3 overs on day 4

Firdose Moonda in Harare06-Sep-2013There is a point in a dream when, no matter how real the events unfolding in the deepest moments of sleep seem, you realise they are not. For Zimbabwe, that happened at the drinks break in the third session. Pakistan were 276 runs ahead, Younis Khan had planted roots into the pitch, Rahat Ali had just hit his first boundary, a disdainful slap off Tendai Chatara’s bowling, and the match was turning.For 11 and half sessions before that interval, Zimbabwe had done most things right. They justified their captain’s decision to bowl first in conditions which could assist the quicks, they batted with Test-match temperament, they made good their lead by bowling well upfront again and they had a decent chance of limiting Pakistan to a gettable total through a miserly effort in the second innings. Until then.It was after that break in play that tired legs and similarly exhausted minds overwhelmed the discipline they showed for most of the day. Fuller lengths played into the hands of the last pair who were obviously looking to accelerate in the latter stages of the innings and Zimbabwe’s gameplan unraveled.After conceding at just 2.6 an over for the 71 overs they bowled in the innings up to that point, Zimbabwe leaked at 6.7 runs an over for the final 8.3 overs. Younis Khan went in search of a double hundred and found it and Rahat Ali proved as good at holding up an end as he did at slogging and looking for singles.During those overs, the complexion of Zimbabwe’s Test changed completely. They went from being in the game to just playing in a game, from being in a position to compete on the final day, to being in a position from which surviving would be the only aim and from being able to think about winning to having to focus only on a draw.Realistically, to expect anything more from Zimbabwe would be fanciful. They have scored over 300 in a fourth innings before but the circumstances were completely different. They achieved the score on a dead Bulawayo track two years ago against New Zealand. They also lost the match.The same happened back in 2002 when they managed 310 against Pakistan here in Harare, chasing an improbable 430. Zimbabwean cricket looked completely different then, so any comparisons are unnecessary, although Hamilton Masakadza is a survivor from that very game. But they have never chased in excess of 300 to win and are not contemplating it as a genuine possibility now.”We must be realistic. To get a win would be amazing but we will definitely go into tomorrow playing for the draw,” Grant Flower, Zimbabwe’s batting coach said. “It will be a big challenge for us, against a good attack which includes Saeed Ajmal, especially as it’s keeping a bit low and starting to turn a bit more.”Zimbabwe recognise it would be far better to share honours with Pakistan than to lose. But that realisation – that they have put themselves in a position to beat Pakistan – will sting bitterly when the final analysis of this game is done.For the contest to be decided in 51 balls seems unfair but it is an illustration of how small the margins in Test cricket are. Considering that a maximum of 2,700 deliveries can be bowled in any Test, 51 balls is a mere 1.8%. Numerically, that is how fine the room for error was in this Test. That percentage can translate to something like a dropped catch, of which Zimbabwe had two. Letting Younis Khan off the hook on 83 and 117 proved to be expensive mistakes. Had either Tino Mawoyo or Malcolm Waller held on, Zimbabwe could have been looking at a much smaller target.”Test cricket is cruel and we saw that. We dropped Younis twice and he made us pay,” Flower said. That’s what class batsmen do.”It can also manifest itself in the small errors of judgment bowlers make as a batsmen of Younis’ quality wears them down. A touch too full or too short can happen to anyone but the longer one is out there, the more chance there is of it occurring, especially with an attack that essentially had four specialist bowlers and Hamilton Masakadza to operate as the fifth.Zimbabwe’s cricketers last played a Test over five months ago and this is only their fifth Test in two years. They are not used to regular rigours of the longest format and eventually, that started to show.”In the last hour or so that we were out there fatigue set in, both physical and mental and we couldn’t take back control,” Flower said. “Those passages of play where the ability to drive proceedings no longer exists, is where advantages are squandered.”Whatever happens on the final day, there is no doubt Zimbabwe have improved as a Test nation. Flower regarded the performance so far as the best of 2013 especially because it has come “against one of the best sides in the world and with all the off-field problems”. He admitted they will look for the draw tomorrow and hope to build on the gains made in the next match.But what happens after that? With the Sri Lanka visit certain to be postponed and no Test cricket scheduled for 11 months until South Africa are due to visit in August 2014, the gains made now may end up being worth nothing by the next time Zimbabwe take the field in whites.”That’s what we face in Zimbabwe,” Flower said. “We’re used to practicing a lot because we don’t play much so we have a big emphasis on fitness but we also need to be playing tough international sides in between that because otherwise you get left behind.”If that were to happen even more than it already has, Zimbabwean cricket would face a much ruder awakening than the one they had in the last 8.3 overs of the Pakistan innings today.

To this fan, Sachin Tendulkar is a kid who managed to extend his childhood beyond its definition

Rajan Thambehalli 13-Oct-2013As I sat in my drawing room, sipping some ginger honey tea, I heard a small beep. It was my phone and when I walked over to pick it up, I saw a notification which read .I quickly got on to my Twitter feed and checked for more details. I didn’t doubt the veracity of the message, my interest was more about the source. It was the BCCI who had made this announcement on behalf of Tendulkar.The articles started pouring in left, right and centre. All sorts of people put in their views that captured several themes – logical, cynical, critical, dramatic and statistical – but frankly, I didn’t want to reflect on Tendulkar’s decision to retire. I just kept reading one piece after the other.Every now and then, my mind went back to those laminated picture books I have of Tendulkar (3 to 4 rather big ones). They are still stacked in my room in India and remain my prized possession. My thoughts then drifted to the times I played cricket as a kid. What made me love this game to this day? Is it because the game by itself was so attractive or were there other factors influencing me to take it up?How old had I been? Six, no, five, maybe even younger when I picked up a bat or ball for the first time. Our house was a little way from the city centre and so I didn’t have the luxury of having too many friends. There were three others who were of my age and we started playing cricket on the streets; having a proper ground was unimaginable in those days. Notwithstanding the occasional tips from the elders, we were mostly left on our own to understand the game, a challenge which we relished.Around that time, the cricket world witnessed the birth of the Tendulkar phenomenon. He was young and so were we which brought about an instant connection, a bond which became stronger by the day. I started playing cricket everywhere – on the roads, inside the house and any place which was sufficient to enable my obsession. It didn’t take long for school to become the extra-curricular activity.Outside of my family, Tendulkar has been a constant throughout my life and now that connection is on its way to breaking. He gave me immense joy, and occasionally the source of my tears. He made me go mad. He frustrated and inspired me. He made me a thinker, made me a believer and even gave me the confidence to go after my dreamsWho is Tendulkar? God? No. Demi-god? No. Superhuman with magical powers? No. An ordinary human beingwith extreme talent. Not quite. To me he is a kid who managed to extend his childhood beyond its definition.I believe there is a kid inside every adult, but in Tendulkar’s case, it is the other way around. He is still a kid, and kids tend to move on to a new toy or next set of challenges when they are bored with the existing toy or the next one is more attractive. I believe Tendulkar has reached that phase in his childhood where playing cricket no longer gives him the fun it once did. He has made this call to move on with his life and let the adult in him take over from now on. If cricket was his favourite toy, he has played with it more than one could possibly imagine. He will pad up for his final two tests as an adult, fully aware that his childhood days are now over.My association with cricket started with Tendulkar and with his retirement, a big chunk of my childhood is lost. That void will be replaced by my memories of him as I move on with life, remembering the times when I did everything I could to just watch Tendulkar play.If you have a submission for Inbox, send it to us here, with “Inbox” in the subject line

Mumbai Indians’ twin titles vindicated their strategy of chasing the big players, who proved too much for the less glittering names in Rajasthan Royals

Siddarth Ravindran06-Oct-2013Mumbai Indians had begun their defense of 202 in the final with Sachin Tendulkar being given a guard of honour by his team-mates and it ended with him being chaired off the field by them. It was the perfect sign-off for the man to whom the entire Mumbai campaign was dedicated (#ThisTimeFor10dulkar) and who was retiring from short-form cricket after the game.It was also a perfect ending to the second three-year cycle for Mumbai, who added the Champions League title to their IPL trophy. Mumbai were the most expensive IPL franchise when the league came into existence back in 2008, had the biggest name in Indian cricket as their icon, and have relentlessly done all it takes to reinforce their squad – sometimes even causing rule changes, such as the infamous five overseas players decision in 2010 which briefly earned them the nickname Mumbai Foreigners.When Kieron Pollard became the hottest thing in T20s after the 2009 CLT20, Mumbai opened the cheque book to land him in a secret tiebreaker at the following auction. In 2010, after retaining four marquee names, they also splashed $2m to sign on the biggest star from their home city, and possibly the best batsman over six seasons of the IPL, Rohit Sharma.When the 2011 campaign spluttered and part-timer Ambati Rayudu wasn’t deemed good enough to be the regular wicketkeeper, in came the country’s second-best Twenty20 wicketkeeper-batsman, Dinesh Karthik. It was a buy outside the auction and reportedly cost them $2.35m. In that failed 2011 campaign, the little-known Ali Murtuza was the team’s second spinner, another department the management thought needed strengthening. Within 10 days of bringing in Karthik, left-arm spinner Pragyan Ojha – the leading wicket-taker in the 2010 season – was bought, again outside the auction.And for the thorny problem of who to open with Sachin Tendulkar, Mumbai chased every flavour-of-the-season opener – whether it was Davy Jacobs after his strong show at the 2010 Champions League or Richard Levi after he made his name with the quickest T20 international century in 2012, before settling on Dwayne Smith. In 2013, they spent a million on Glenn Maxwell and used him mainly for carrying drinks in the IPL, giving him just three games.All of which meant that even without one of the world’s premier T20 bowlers, Lasith Malinga, and benching Mitchell Johnson, they could field a side in the CLT20 final with ten internationals. Only the seamer Rishi Dhawan hasn’t represented his country yet, and even he might not have got a look-in if Munaf Patel’s bowling hadn’t deteriorated badly over the last season.Mumbai’s cocktail of talent, temperament and experience proved too much for their opponents, the cash-strapped Rajasthan Royals. Without the finances to secure too many of the format’s leading players, Royals have relied instead on clever cut-rate overseas buys, like James Faulkner and Kevon Cooper, and on scouting talented no-namers.0:00

Time with Rajasthan Royals has been a learning experience – Ajinkya Rahane

That made them everybody’s favourite underdog team in the IPL, and has unearthed some of the most heart-warming narratives in the tournament. Two of their heroes in the final were 41-year-old legspinner Pravin Tambe, whose story is the stuff of screenplays, and 18-year-old Sanju Samson who served notice of his abilities with a series of clean hits that kept Royals alive despite starting the chase needing over 10 an over.Royals also beat better-resourced opponents by making full use of the home advantage, winning all 13 matches this year on a pacy Jaipur surface, which generally hasn’t lent itself to big scores – only one team reached 180 at the Sawai Mansingh stadium during the IPL season.In every Royals press conference the talk is about the strong team spirit, and how the emphasis is on the team and not on big names. That spirit had to be reforged after the spot-fixing scandal rocked the side in the 2013 season, and left them without four of their players.Despite overcoming that challenge, and producing exceptional performances from several wild-card picks, and their perfect home record, they couldn’t complete the final step of their dream. Even as Tendulkar was carried off the field by jubilant team-mates, he was watched from the sidelines by a morose Rahul Dravid, who was also representing his IPL team for the final time.This time the Goliaths of the IPL had beaten the Davids.

There has been a noticeable spring in South Africa’s step over recent days after their remarkable turnaround in fortunes

Firdose Moonda26-Feb-2014Sports teams would have us believe winning, just like eating for a chef or travelling for an airline pilot, is just part of the job. That it is the best, most exciting, most fun and most enviable part of the job is something they do not often admit, especially in the middle of a series, because it could result in them getting carried away. Finally, someone has broken the mould.We all knew already what Russell Domingo confirmed but at least he did: nothing beats coming out on top. So, he seems to have allowed his team to bask in the glory of their St George’s Park victory instead of limiting them to the dreaded task of focusing solely on the function and he joined some of the celebration himself.”The breakfast area the day after winning a cricket game and the day after losing a cricket game is totally different,” Domingo said. “No matter how you try not to emphasise the importance of winning because you want to focus on your processes, winning is very important. The general vibe around the team after a good win – there is so much more energy when compared to after a loss.”That may be why Hashim Amla was willing to go as far as announcing it was advantage South Africa heading to Newlands, why Morne Morkel was spotted strolling carefree along the Port Elizabeth beachfront the day after the triumph and why Dean Elgar had time to seek out a doppelganger on Twitter (the lookalike is a South African radio host) in the lead up to the third Test. The Australian have also taken some out – three days actually – but Domingo hinted they would used it differently, given how he explained the aftermath of a loss.”There’s a lot of tension after a loss, a lot of reflection, a lot of what ifs, should we have, could we have…” he said, which would also have explained South Africa’s tension ahead of the second Test. “After a win you just really try and emphasise the good stuff and that’s the feeling I get at the moment. There’s a good energy around the side and guys know they have played more to their potential than in the first Test – probably not at their best but to their potential in this last Test match.”A mantra of “we can always get better,” is as formulaic as sports teams trying to deflect attention of victory but for the South African team, as they stand right now, it is not far off the mark. There are areas where they need to improve ahead of the series decider and fielding is one of them. South Africa’s displays in both Tests have been riddled with fumbles and dotted with dropped catches.However, a Domingo in good spirits does not seem too worried about that. “We’ve generally fielded well and taken good catches. But it’s like everything else in the game. If you put one or two down, there’s always a little bit of anxiety around that,” he said. But what if you put down seven?That is how many South African have let slip so far, with five of them alone off David Warner. The opening batsman may not be Australia’s top run-scorer in the series if it was not for those mistakes. South Africa do not currently have a fielding coach but that should not even be a factor. No one should be needed to teach international cricketers to catch. “No one does it on purpose but it’s something that we are a little bit aware of and are trying to improve on,” Domingo said,He was similarly nonplussed about their use of the DRS. “It’s the same thing with the referrals: if you get one or two wrong and the next one comes, you think ‘Oh damn, I’d better not stuff this one up. Let’s not do it.’ It’s a little bit of the same anxiety.”Graeme Smith has had a tough time with technology, allowing Mitchell Johnson (first Test, first innings), Peter Siddle (second Test, first innings), Nathan Lyon (second Test, first innings) and Chris Rogers (second Test, second innings) to get away when they would have been out had he called for DRS and incorrectly asking for referrals off Warner (first Test, second innings) and Rogers (second Test, first innings). He had a similar struggle with his own form with no scores over 15 so far but Domingo believes he is due.”I am not really too concerned. Graeme’s record speaks for itself. It’s very seldom that he goes through a series without making a contribution – I am talking about with the bat, because he makes a massive contribution as the leader,” Domingo said. “It’s not something I am too fazed about. He is a quality player. He is playing well at the moment, he is looking in good touch, he has just found ways of getting out.”On his home ground, in the last Test of the summer Smith will have the perfect opportunity to turn things around and have the final say of the season. He may even get the surface he wants to do it on. Domingo said South Africa want nothing more than a “good cricket wicket,” and early signs suggest Newlands will produce one.Domingo had a brief chat with Evan Flint, the groundsman, and saw that the pitch “looks like a wicket that is ready to play on tomorrow,” so Flint will “probably want to keep a bit more moisture in it.” With heat and wind dominating the build-up, Flint has had the top drying out but not the whole surface, now that the gust has let up, he can bake the pitch before match day to present something everyone will be happy with.That leaves only one person likely to receive bad news ahead of the third Test: Robin Peterson. Domingo admitted he was happy enough with the job JP Duminy did in Port Elizabeth and even though he does not have an XI yet, it seems Peterson will not find his way back in. “In South Africa, the spinner’s role is very much of a holding role and I thought JP and Dean did a very good job for us in the second Test,” he said.Everyone else can simply enjoy that winning feeling.

Starring Srini, Miley, Ban Ki, Andy Z and a number of other superstars

Andy Zaltzman04-Feb-2014At last, one of the darkest chapters in English cricket’s playing history has been completed. Whoever wrote that chapter has a dangerously twisted imagination, verging on the sadistic. Parts of the next edition of will read like a gratuitously grisly crime novel.It has been a three-month, three-format thrashing of historic proportions, in which England have been smithereened on and off the field. They were dismal in the Tests, careless in the ODIs, and clueless in the T20s. It has been one of the great sporting disintegrations. On the positive side, it did not go quite as badly as Briddleswick CC’s club tour of Pompeii in 79 AD. Although historians may well still be picking over the remnants of this winter’s whackings in thousands of years’ time.Also on the positive side, England can now look forward, rather than merely try to assuage their cricketing pain by trying to lose limited-overs matches by a dignified margin.For the first time in years, there is massive uncertainty about England’s Test line-up. The bulk of the side Flower led to Australia had been there since his first tour, to the West Indies, five years previously. By contrast, here is The Confectionery Stall’s England team for the first Test against Sri Lanka in June:Cook (captain), AN Other, AN Other, AN Other, AN Other, Stokes, AN Other (wk), AN Other, Broad, AN Other, AN Other.Cook deserves the opportunity to learn from the batterings of this tour, although his batting has been patchy for the last two years, and was damagingly vulnerable in the two Ashes series. Stokes was the sole significant positive from the five Tests of Torture, and Broad bowled decently throughout (although he could do with watching some videos of himself batting from a few years ago) (not just the highlights).I contemplated leaving out one of the AN Others for Bell, the decisive player in last summer’s victory, but after only two good series in the last nine (in five of which he has averaged under 30), he should be expected to find runs and fluency in first-class cricket. Pietersen’s place is partly squabble-dependent, but he has done little since his Mumbai masterpiece 14 months and 14 Tests ago. Anderson deserves leeway but needs wickets. Root should be persevered with as a long-term prospect, but that does not necessarily mean he must be part of England’s immediate Test future. Botham is too old, Hammond too dead, and Grace too controversial. Thus, eight spots in the team are, or should be, up for grabs. It will be the most eagerly followed start to a county season for years.Alongside the tantalising uncertainty in the make-up of the team, it has also been widely argued that England need to reassess/refresh/sack/impound their support staff. Others have suggested that the players must take responsibility. Which in itself suggests that England need to reassess/refresh/sack/impound their support staff.It seems as good a time as any to speculatively throw out babies with bathwaters, so the Confectionery Stall hereby advocates a complete overhaul of the England backroom. The world must be scoured for the best available candidates to drive and guide the renaissance of English cricket after its three-month Dark Ages. No expense should be spared. No obstacle should be insurmountable in the quest to give Cook, Stokes, Broad and the eight AN Others the best possible support structures to play to the best of their abilities.The Support Staff to Take England Back to the Summit of Mount CricketBatting Coach: F Bruce
For the past few years, England’s batsmen have been overseen by two leviathans of modern batsmanship – Flower, a one-man statistical miracle, and Gooch, England’s record run scorer, player of some of England’s greatest innings, and a man who spectacularly cracked Test cricket late in his career after years of undulating form and disrupted availability. Despite the input of two of the most knowledgeable sages of batsmanship in the known universe, in 30 Tests since January 2012, no England batsman has averaged over 40 in Tests (excluding one-Test, once-out Chris Woakes). Clearly, it is therefore time for them to be coached by someone who knows absolutely nothing about batting. BBC newsreader and frontwoman Fiona Bruce fits the bill perfectly. I assume.Bowling Coach: N Srinivasan
The ECB’s new best buddy might have no expertise when it comes to bowling, nor any discernible fondness for cricket, but England should attempt to coax the BCCI supremo into their inner circle with the offer of a plum coaching job. This could be a valuable first step on the road towards creating a joint England-India Test team that could be charged out at astronomical hourly rates to play against other Test nations, if any of them can afford it, or, more profitably, large multinational corporations, or XIs put together by dubious billionaire Russian oligarchs.Fielding Coach: M Cyrus
The alleged singer, notorious cricket obsessive, and self-styled Professor of Twerkology at the University of Grind, claims to have modelled her trademark posterial posturing on a combination of Sir Garfield Sobers clipping one to square leg, Imran Khan following through after bowling, and England’s 1981 Ashes-winning slip cordon.Her renowned tongue-out facial hallmark, meanwhile, is an obvious homage to her lifelong heroes Ravichandran Ashwin and Harbhajan Singh, and yet another expression of her obsession with subcontinental offspin. This lifelong passion famously reached its zenith when she had a large tattoo of 1980s Pakistan tweaker Tauseef Ahmed plastered all over her left crumbleflump to celebrate her 18th birthday.Cyrus, who according to her publicist is “half-way through the second draft of her warts-and-all biography of David Boon”, topped the charts last year with her single “Wrecking Ball”, which is considered by most music experts to be the most moving song ever written about Angus Fraser’s offcutter. Furthermore, the former star and Tennessee Women’s Under-23 3rd XI allrounder reportedly limbers up for her energetically gluteal dance routines by having her long-time choreographer and confidante Derek Randall hurl cricket balls at her via a slip-catching cradle.The partially nude songstress would bring an innovative approach to often mundane fielding drills, and would help draw media glare away from England’s beleaguered players. An outstanding candidate for the all-new Team England.Chairman of Selectors: HRH Queen Elizabeth II
Long-serving professional monarch would bring natty headgear and a constitutionally impartial perspective to team selection. Experienced, even-handed, popular, and almost psychotically obsessive about county averages.Motivational Psychologist: Pope Francis
It would take a big compensation package to prise the Vatican No. 1 away from St Peter’s, but the star Pope has made a big impact in a short time in Rome with his refreshingly modern attitudes, and could do the same with English cricket.

United Nations secretary-general and 60s-rock-drumming-sceptic Ban Keith Moon will bring an air of international authority to England’s media relations. Years of attempting to defuse combustible international spats make him the ideal man to ensure Pietersen takes the field again

Statistician: W Buffett
Hyperbillionaire business wiz and philanthropy celeb with a lifetime’s mastery of turning numbers into much bigger numbers. Viewed by the ECB as “significantly less likely than Allen Stanford to find himself slammed up in an American penitentiary wearing what looks like the Dutch one-day kit”, Buffett’s tax bracket commands the instant respect of 21st-century sports players. Would also be able to buy the entire IPL and relocate it to Chad, to bring an end to any T20-aggravated tension in the England dressing room.Dietician: H Blumenthal
Eight-two-page recipe pamphlets would become a thing of the past with the Michelin-star-spangled concocter of complicated comestibles – 82 pages would barely even cover a single Blumenthal starter. The Fat Duck frontman’s flamboyantly experimental yet scientific approach to cookery could help unlock a more adventurous England. As the old saying goes: “eat defensive, bat defensive” (Marcel Proust, , 1922).Dishes to be served at Blumenthal’s proposed cricket-themed megabistro in the pavilion at Leicestershire’s Grace Road ground include: freshly skittled tail-end of monkfish, thinly snicked into a cordon of shrimp slips, served with slow-grafted crab Chanderpaul, potato Inzamams and yorked carrot stumps, and drizzled in a Bob Hollandaise sauce.Fitness Coach: U Bolt
Two-time treble-Olympic sprint champion has all the know-how to turn Monty Panesar into a turf-scorching exocet in the field.Sledging Consultant: J Sadowitz
Legendarily foul-mouthed Scottish magician-cum-comedian – the British Shane Warne, in many people’s eyes – will give England a harsher, more expletive-ridden edge in the verbal jousting that has become “all part and parcel of the game”. The Miles Davis of Swearing.Media Manager: BK Moon
United Nations secretary-general and 60s-rock-drumming-sceptic Ban Keith Moon will bring an air of international authority to England’s media relations. Years of attempting to defuse combustible international spats make him the ideal man to ensure Pietersen takes the field again in an England jersey, even if he has to be escorted to the crease by an international peace-keeping force.Head Coach: A Zaltzman
Has never failed in a top-level coaching role. Undefeated in Tests as both a player and a coach. Plenty of spare time.These are extreme times for the England team. They require extreme measures. And they also require a separate coach for T20 internationals. To have the same coach in five-day cricket as three-hour cricket is akin to hiring the same composer to create both an orchestral symphony expressing fundamental truths about the human condition and an advertising jingle for children’s processed-cheese snacklets. You might find someone who can cover both disciplines. But you would probably be better off not burdening that person with two such non-complementary duties.