by Andrew Miller

'The batting efforts of our opposition are not assisting the development of our bowlers' one-day skills': John Buchanan might wish to reconsider that statement after six losses in seven matches © AFP

At the very moment of Australia's third defeat of the Chappell-Hadlee Trophy in Hamilton yesterday, the cameras panned - like the ghouls that they are - to the balcony of the visitors' dressing-room, where the coach, John Buchanan, was bookishly scribbling his final notes of
a chastening trip across the Tasman. After the fortnight he has endured, the man they call Ned Flanders was probably just filling out a final string of ho-diddly-hums before dumping the entire portfolio in the shredder.

"The batting efforts of our opposition are not assisting the development of our bowlers' one-day skills," were just a few of the many words Buchanan had uttered at the midpoint of the CB Series, a long-forgotten era when Australia were lords of all they surveyed, and England and New Zealand were mere timorous serfs at the banquet. Six defeats have since followed from their last seven matches - Australia's worst run of ODI form in a decade - and it's safe to say those skills have now been tested to breaking point.

Hubris, they call it. Exaggerated pride or self-confidence, often resulting in fatal retribution. It was a crime in Ancient Greece, and it's still a crime in the eyes of Buchanan's critics, both at home and away. Shane Warne, who memorably suggested that the role of the coach
was to drive the players from the hotel to the ground, this week elbowed his way to the head of a long queue of detractors, and pinned the blame for Australia's failings firmly on a man whom he believes has been a passenger throughout the team's unprecedented era of success.

Somewhere on the other side of the world, enjoying some family time in Cape Town no doubt, Duncan Fletcher will doubtless be permitting himself a wry grin at the chain of events of the past few days. Two weeks ago, there was only one international coach with his head in the
crosswires, and it wasn't the man who had just delivered a 5-0 Ashes whitewashing in his final Test series. But then, at the eleventh hour of the tour, Fletcher spirited up some last-minute silverware to salvage his reputation, just as Buchanan steered his farewell cruise
onto the rocks.

It's a coach's life. As a convoluted southern summer draws to a close, we're left to reflect on the successes and failures of two of the most dissimilar men of their genre - Buchanan the Nutty Professor and Fletcher the Inscrutable Seer, whose differing methods have been both utterly vindicated and hopelessly ridiculed this season, almost in the same breath.

Of the two, there is no doubt that Buchanan looks the most naked in defeat. He fell flat on his face after a solitary season at Middlesex in 1998 because none of the players could penetrate his corporate jargon, and in the 2005 Ashes he was ridiculed for having no answers when Australia's bowlers started malfunctioning. "Where is your bowling coach," everyone cried at Trent Bridge as no-ball followed no-ball and basic disciplines disappeared through the side door (The man they so needed, Troy Cooley, was in England's camp as it happens).

But perhaps that is exactly as it should be. A man should be at his most vulnerable when there is something to be vulnerable about, and in Buchanan's case that is, in fact, next to never. In his seven-year tenure, he has presided over an incredible 69 Test wins out of 90, and 24 series wins out of 28. Of the four rubbers that got away, only two ended up in outright defeat - and these were two of the greatest series of all time, against India in 2000-01 and, of course, the
Ashes.

Of course, in an era where no team has come close to challenging Australia, Barney the Bear could probably have coached such superlative charges, but Buchanan has been on hand to provide the challenge himself. One day it's the witterings of Sun Tsu, the next it's a pre-Ashes boot camp in the Queensland jungle. Warne certainly wasn't convinced of his methods and nor, it would seem, was Ricky Ponting. In the wake of the Ashes whitewash, Ponting attempted to
convey the gist of a team-talk that Buchanan had given during the Sydney Test, but admitted as his narrative tailed off that he had "probably been asleep for most of it".

Whatever happened to 'Duncan days' in Australia? © Getty Images

But there is, of course, one final function of a coach, and arguably it is the most important of all. He is the team scapegoat, the man upon whom the brickbats rain down when the results start to go awry. Fletcher played this role to perfection when Nasser Hussain and Michael Vaughan were his captains, lurking in the shadows when the going was good but quick to step forward on his designated "Duncan Days". But having failed to forge the same bond when Andrew Flintoff
was in charge, he abandoned his duty all too readily and left the captain to utter the same unconvincing platitudes day after day after day.

Buchanan is now also right in the firing line, and given the litany of injuries, retirements, paternity breaks and general weariness that is afflicting his team at present, he couldn't really be better positioned.

"The decision-making that accompanies being placed under the microscope of competition," was another thing that Buchanan wanted his bowlers to be tested on in these recent contests. Nathan Bracken, for one, is probably very grateful that everyone is still preoccupied with
working out what this means.

by Tim de Lisle

Playing on, and on but at whose expense? © Getty Images

A cricketer's life is made up of a million little decisions. Should he play the ball or leave it, attack or defend, hook or duck, run or shout "waiting!", shape it in or away, go over or round the wicket, bust a gut or bowl within himself, sign for Gray Nicolls or Gunn & Moore? Big decisions, on the other hand, are few and far between, unless he becomes a captain. He might get right to the top and never have a real dilemma. But in the end he can expect to face a big one: to retire or not to retire.

Damien Martyn has taken the bold option, going suddenly, not hanging around for a last hurrah. His departure was as crisp as his offside strokeplay. A tough decision that the selectors had ducked, by bringing him back last season, ended up being taken by the player himself. The same may happen with Ashley Giles in the next few months.

It's understandable that selectors should be confused. International cricket careers are like jeans: there's much less agreement than there once was on how long they should be.

Mike Atherton, who retired at 33 after 13 years with England, said recently that long careers were over. He cited two of his opening partners - Graham Gooch (20 years an England player) and Alec Stewart (14) - as having the sort of careers that wouldn't happen any more.

It's true that England careers are getting shorter in terms of time. The typical major one now lasts 12 to 15 years for a batsman, about 10 for a bowler. Nasser Hussain spanned 15 years (with two long gaps, when the England selectors regarded him as more of a troublemaker than a
potential saviour), Graham Thorpe 12. Darren Gough lasted nine years in Tests, making a Martyn-like exit, but then going the other way and sticking around for 12 years in one-dayers. Andy Caddick managed a round decade, 1993 to 2003, and signed off with an Ashes seven-for.
He's not in Australia now, is he?

Around the world, careers are getting longer, when the injury gods allow. Brian Lara made his Test debut 16 years ago this week. Sachin Tendulkar is past 17 years, which means he has been a Test cricketer for more than half his life. Anil Kumble is on 16, three more than Bishen Bedi. Wasim Akram did 17, Waqar Younis 14. Courtney Walsh did 17, where most of the great West Indian bowlers settled for 12.

Tendulkar has batted for 48,000 minutes in international cricket, which is 5,000 more than Steve Waugh, and probably more than anybody ever, though Geoff Boycott would have done it in one innings if he had only lived a little earlier and played in the Timeless Test

But the most dramatic change has come in Australia, where careers have ballooned like children's waistlines. Glenn McGrath has done 13 years and still wants more. Shane Warne is coming up to 15 years and probably thinking in terms of another five. Old Chinese proverb say, if a man appears in adverts for hair studios, he's not about to rush out of the limelight.

When excellence and durability combine as they have with Australia's 35-year-olds, something else follows: the next generation misses out. Only two current Australian players have a realistic chance of following Warne and McGrath up into the rarefied air of 120 Test caps:
Ricky Ponting, who will get there next year and possibly go on to break all records, and Michael Clarke. Other players, even when they are as good as Mike Hussey, are going to get half a career, if that. It's going to be fascinating to watch the big woolly moustaches on the
Aussie selection panel manage these transitions.

Troy Cooley, the only man currently on the way to his second successive Ashes triumph, says fast bowlers can go on to 40 now, and McGrath is hoping he is right. But nobody actually has. Even Walsh stopped at 38. Richard Hadlee and Imran Khan just made it past their 39th birthdays, although both at reduced pace, and in less treadmillish times, and Imran converted himself from a bowler who batted into a batsman who bowled.

A few years ago there was a theory that miles on the clock were what counted, rather than sheer years. Waqar Younis may have been a case in point (though doubts about his birth certificate rather muddied the waters), and Marcus Trescothick could be now. But if cricketers were like cars, some of today's veterans would already be in the scrapyard. Tendulkar has batted for 48,000 minutes in international cricket, which is 5000 more than Steve Waugh, and probably more than anybody ever, though Geoff Boycott would have done it in one innings if
he had only lived a little earlier and played in the Timeless Test.

Yet Tendulkar still has an appetite. And so do Muralitharan and Warne, who have bowled 50,000 international deliveries each, while only one other man (Kumble) has passed 41,000. How long is a career? We are in the process of finding out.

Kevin Mitchell

'Michael Clarke did the right thing when he waved away appeals for a 'catch' he had scooped up from Jacob Oram' © Getty Images

The notion that a cricketer would cheat has always been seriously at odds with the supposed spirit of the game, and too unpalatable to contemplate. It is a naive
view and it ignores both history and human nature.

When Dwayne Bravo emerged somewhat less than exuberantly from his outfield tumble and roll to send back Michael Yardy in England's final match of the Champions Trophy in India with a catch that video replays showed had bounced in front of him, you did not have to wait long for the head-scratching in the commentary box.

The pause reflected obvious misgivings. But it also underlined the reluctance of commentators ever to draw the instant conclusion that a player would do something underhand. In football, the outraged response to a foul or dive is in-built; in cricket the default reaction is: surely not!

I'm not calling Bravo a cheat. Only he knows how right or wrong he was to claim that catch. But it didn't look good. It was a decent piece of athleticism that put him in position to attempt it in the first place, yet he hardly celebrated accordingly.

There followed the sort of moral confusion cricket has had to face with increasing regularity. It is a game saddled with impossibly high standards from the past. It has also become, over the past decade, a game scrutinised to an unprecedented level by TV cameras. There is no hiding place.

Bravo was charged with failing to "conduct play within the spirit of the game". This arose from repeated viewings of the slow-motion film which left no doubt the ball had bounced up from the turf into his hands.

The buck was then passed to the match referee, Mike Procter, who didn't so much drop it as bin it. He will say he had a tough call to make. The evidence was incriminating, no doubt, but the bounce was small enough for Procter to judge, purely on the player's say-so, that Bravo may not have been aware of it. Procter chose the word of the player. The expensive, hi-tech video evidence became suddenly, curiously, ludicrously irrelevant. It was like being presented with the body, but agreeing with the accused that he could not be sure if he meant to pull the trigger.

The mantra from older players goes that in times gone by there would have been no dilemma: before super slo-mo, the snickometer, Hawk-Eye and all the other gadgets, players were scrupulously honest. If the ball fell short, they would not claim it; if they got an edge, they walked.

Well, we all know that was not universally the case. And how could it be? Cricketers then might have lived in an age more obviously imbued with a sense of fair play, uncorrupted by the sort of money available today, but they were just as fallible and weak as any gold-digging, passport-swapping, bet-taking soldier of fortune in the modern game.

'It was a decent piece of athleticism from Bravo that put him in position to attempt it in the first place, yet he hardly celebrated accordingly' © AFP

If Bravo was guilty, it was in his lack of side. He pouched the chance and walked slowly back towards the bowler with little show of emotion. Into that look and stroll could be read several interpretations: he is one cool dude, he was waiting for the video replay, he wasn't sure at all if the ball had smacked him square in the hands with no deflection ... or he at least briefly suspected that the ball had had the sting taken from its journey by the ground.

In effect, he gave himself the benefit of the doubt. So did Procter. But the match referee's version was, in my opinion, just as flawed. "Television replays appeared to show the ball bounced but Dwayne thought he had taken the catch cleanly," Procter said. "From my experience as a player I know that can happen, but we needed to ask the question to make sure it was a
genuine mistake by the player. For that reason the umpires were right to lay the charge but, after we all talked it through, I had no reason to disbelieve Dwayne's version of events."

That is clearly nonsense. The reason he had to at least seriously doubt "Dwayne's version of events" was what his eyes told him when he examined the replay. The reason he had to believe him was he found it uncomfortable to come to the conclusion that Bravo would try to deceive him. And maybe the player didn't. Perhaps he was totally innocent. And, given the parameters,
Procter had no choice but to acquit.

Yet, despite his eminence as a former player, I have to take issue with Procter's logic, and, by
inference, that of Bravo. Bravo said he had no doubt he caught it; Procter said that sometimes it is hard to tell. You can't have it both ways.

A few days later, Michael Clarke did the right thing when he waved away appeals for a 'catch' he had scooped up from Jacob Oram. He knew it had bounced first and he said so instantly. Anyone who has played the game, at any level, knows there is a different feel between a ball that lands at unimpeded speed square in the hands and one that is even minimally slowed
down by hitting the ground. Indeed, a half-volley invariably nestles in the hand much more gently than a ball that flies above the turf. And certainly a genuine catch has that unmistakeable "smack" about it. Did Bravo know? I hope his take on it was genuine. But, if
he was in the slightest doubt, he should have called for the replay himself, and accepted the decision. Those last three words should be what cricket is all about.

by Bob Woolmer

Herschelle Gibbs meets Delhi police again © Getty Images

There are not many days that go by in the subcontinent where innuendo and speculation end up making a newspaper piece or invite TV comment. For Pakistan there is a sign hanging over us: "Normal service will be resumed soon".

However, what normal service is has yet to be defined, although the cricketers have made it clear that focusing on the game is the most important issue and they want to leave all the baggage behind. Yet controversy, as I said, is the food of the Indian media and without a word of warning it all started again with an article suggesting that Scotland Yard will now be called on to look back at the 1999 World Cup.

This comes after the recent Herschelle Gibbs interview/interrogation with the Delhi police in Mumbai. KK Paul, the Delhi police commissioner who raised the alarm in 2000 with the Cronjegate tapes, chatted to Gibbs, and suddenly poor old Derek Crookes, the South African spinner, was implicated. Now you have to know Crookes - and I do as we have been on at least two tours together - and I remember him being adamant against any dealings with bookies while playing on the 1996 tour.

It was in Kanpur that Hansie Cronje was invited by Mohammad Azharuddin to meet a keen cricket fan; I was present when they were introduced in the lobby and then they went off to a room. What happened then has been recorded at the King Commission held in 2000 in Cape Town.

During the early years of speculation, people looked for any signs that money might have exchanged hands. The Pakistan against Bangladesh game [during the 1999 World Cup] at Northampton was a case in point.

The first games looked at were those slating minnows against the big boys, and now recent newspaper reports suggest that South Africa's game against Zimbabwe at Chelmsford is suspect because Zimbabwe beat us. On the day Zimbabwe played better cricket and we were extremely disappointed - in fact Cronje and I had an argument over the way we had prepared for the game, having gone to Holland for the match before, which he felt was disruptive.

Our travel plans were poor and we stayed in a hotel miles out of town. The dressing-rooms at Chelmsford are too small for touring teams and the net bowlers were poor at practice. A lot of small things started to conspire against our preparation.

By the time the Zimbabwe game arrived we were all pretty ratty. That, more than any other reason, was why we did not perform to our best. Also, in those days Zimbabwe were a good team and not the complete underdogs they are now. They were quite capable of beating anyone in the tournament. There was no question of any betting or bookie involvement that I knew about.

Even more bizarre is that the detectives have been asked to take a look at the earpieces (and microphones) that were used at Hove during the game against India. I say bizarre because, quite frankly, the earpieces were used for one hour and ten minutes before we were instructed to stop by the match referee.

The players then did not have any microphones or transmitters with them - it was only one-way communication, from the coach to the player. The practice has since been banned by the ICC. Allan Donald and Cronje were wearing the two earpieces but any suggestion that we were using them for betting purposes is mere speculation and far removed from the truth.

I guess that my career as a coach will go down as one with its fair share of controversy and trying to explain exactly what really happened. At the same time, it is very disappointing that Cronjegate has resurfaced after six years.

More importantly I need to concentrate on the cricket that we [Pakistan] are playing. Normal service has to be resumed.

'Tom Moody insisted that our mental attitude had to change if we were to satisfy our own high ambitions' © Getty Images

There is one simple word that best describes why this Sri Lanka team has changed for the better: It's called "attitude". There has been a sea-change in the way we all are approaching cricket thanks to the efforts of Tom Moody, Trevor Penney and the rest of the management
team. Their greatest success has been to shake us out of our comfort zones and introduce a new culture of self-improvement and dynamism. The changes have been seismic and have ensured that we are now growing stronger by the day.

After Tom's arrival in Sri Lanka we quickly settled into a successful groove. We defeated (a weakened) West Indies, won the Indian Oil Cup and brushed aside Bangladesh. With hindsight I think we were lulled into a comfort zone. We thought this was the best we could be and expected victories to come our way. But the tour of India proved a rude shock to the system. We were still grappling with the Powerplays and Supersub regulations and in the end we were hammered in both the ODIs and the Tests. Suddenly it sunk in that other teams were improving much faster than us.

This was the context in which Tom started to usher in changes to the team, by altering our "attitude" to not just matches but to net practice, fitness training and even our lifestyles. We were one of the fitter teams in the world and we'd always had our fair share of skilful players. But we'd lost sight of the fact that there is always room for improvement. Tom insisted that our mental attitude had to change if we were to satisfy our own high ambitions.

It started with a special emphasis on physical fitness that was tailor-made to individual needs. We had worked hard previously but within limits. We realised that we could be fitter and that we could do things differently. We pushed our boundaries and looked to exploit
every advantage we could, from our actual running and turning techniques to building up much greater endurance levels. We were given minimum fitness levels to qualify for selection and soon the pride of the players pushed them to reach these and, then, to go further.

We were very lucky too to have the help of Sandy Gordon, one of the world's leading sports psychologists. In my mind his inputs have been instrumental to us. Through a series of informal one-on-ones on cricket and our lives in general he offered customised advice to each individual. In short, he gave us options on how to improve ourselves and helped reinforce the message that we could improve ourselves. I remember one thing he told me very clearly: "The only direction you can cruise is down".

Sandy had an impact on us as individuals and also as a team. He pointed out the little details that get lost: the details that we may have thought unimportant but actually go a long way to forming the mental make-up of the team. He made us conscious of how an innocuous negative remark in a dressing-room environment can snowball into a problem. He identified situations where we might be subconsciously limiting ourselves by apportioning blame rather than accepting collective responsibility.

This all led to us as a team putting our core values down on paper. We discussed as a team the characteristics that we cherished within the group - like commitment, discipline, pride and enjoyment. These core values stretched from the field to the dressing-room and into our lives. We wanted the dressing-room to be a neat and positive environment that reflected our professionalism and commitment. We wanted our lifestyles outside to be healthy and well-balanced. We wrote it all down so we would not lose sight of it.

He also, of course, worked on our skills. When I look back now with hindsight on my batting I can see I was in a comfort zone. I was not thinking about broadening my range of strokes. I was subconsciously saying to myself, "this is as good as you are going to get so just
work on your shot selection." But Trevor changed all that. He looked at every single scoring option and stroke with every player. His energy was amazing. We broke down our games and practised on each different aspect.

The impact has been huge. From a personal perspective I can see just how much my game has developed. I used to find it hard to tick things over during the middle overs of one-day games, especially against the spinners. But I worked hard on the sweep and now it is giving me quick scoring opportunities. I have learnt how to drop the ball for singles better and how to guide the ball down to third man. Three simple areas have been vastly improved.

It was all a case of accepting logical analysis. Trevor and Tom were saying "I think you are a good player but I think you can be better, why don't you look at these strokes to reduce pressure?" As players it was about not coming up with excuses and saying to ourselves "this is an avenue worth exploring." We had started a journey but lost our way.
However, we were now pushing out of our comfort zones.

There was a massive attitude shift and now we are looking to capitalise on every single delivery: the simplest theory in cricket and one that had worked so well for us in the past. The extended Powerplays have encouraged this and we strive to capitalise on top and then maintain momentum with smart cricket

One of the huge conundrums with Sri Lanka's cricket has traditionally been the absence of the question "why?" We are generally spoon-fed from an early age. The senior players are expected to know best and you can easily get caught-up in a herd. Nobody thinks of how
things can be changed. An intelligent, questioning attitude is quietly repressed. But to stay ahead you must diversify. What we need is a system from grassroots to the national team that is continuously evolving to make you better. We need to free minds.

During the England tour it first became evident that we were turning the corner. The groundwork had been laid, the processes were in place and without us even realising it all started to come together. The prime example was the Lord's Test where we had the inner strength and confidence to rescue ourselves from a perilous position. It was hugely
satisfying to save that game and a source of great pride. Even though we lost at Edgbaston, we had begun to believe that we were an equal match to England, and were ready as we ever were to win on English soil.

Then, right after the final Test at Trent Bridge, we had a meeting and discussed what Sri Lankan cricket was all about. Pre-1996 we had played a brand of cricket that was not our own. We were respectful to the game's traditions and techniques but it was an alien tradition that we were trying to conform to. Then in 1996 with that emphatic World Cup victory we established our brand of cricket, our own cricketing identity that was positive, aggressive and exciting. As we sat there in England, we realised as a group that we had lost sight of this brand.

I think we had become too passive a one-day team, waiting for our opponents to falter. We were masters of the slow strangle, especially with our spin-heavy attack in the subcontinent. But we now had a diverse and balanced team capable of playing a more aggressive game and we made a conscious decision to go back to that more explosive old
brand. There was a massive attitude shift and now we are looking to capitalise on every single delivery: the simplest theory in cricket and one that had worked so well for us in the past. The extended Powerplays have encouraged this and we strive to capitalise on top and then maintain momentum with smart cricket.

It's been a refreshing period to be in the side and it's wonderful to feel the hunger for success all around you. Right now we are inspiring each other and feeding on each other's confidence. It's exciting and I believe we are well on the way to playing a brand of cricket that will not only be successful but that will allow us as Sri Lankans to be proud.