As a general comment, without the benefit of statistics or specific team strategies, I’d have to say that I think the Batting Powerplay has often been more of a negative than a positive to most teams. I didn’t really watch the recent ODI series’ in West Indies and NZ so I can’t comment on them but in games involving Australia, it seems to me that most captains have yet to learn how to best use their Powerplay.

South Africa have used it to best effect thus far, mainly because they have managed to keep wickets in hand and therefore been able to use Albie Morkel’s clean hitting (and to a lesser extent Duminy and Boucher).

Australia have rarely benefited from it and Pakistan too seem uncertain of the tactics involved in using it for maximum impact. Too often, it is left too late and the teams are almost forced to take the powerplay when their No 9 batsman is at the crease, caught between trying to bat out the full 50 overs and capitalising on the Powerplay.

Too often, batsmen have played a little bit too conservatively leading into the Powerplay and then promptly got out in the first two overs, therefore wasting the very prize they had been waiting for. Perhaps it’s because middle order batsmen are not accustomed to batting in traditional Powerplay situations – they are more adept at finding gaps and working the ball around until the final slog is on.

I think batting captains are taking the Powerplay too late in the innings. Most captains try to take it around the 40th over but too often, wickets are falling and teams are torn between consolidating with new batsmen arriving at the crease or taking risks in the Powerplay which can turn a mini-collapse into a terminal tailspin. In that sense, the Powerplay almost acts like a trap – you feel obliged to walk into it even though you know it could cost you an arm and a leg!

Take Pakistan for example – I think they got their tactics horribly wrong last night chasing a modest 198. From 0/90, needing less than 4 rpo to cruise to victory, they finished up needing about 7 rpo when their final wicket fell. How in the world did they allow that to happen? They ended up not even using up all of their Powerplay which is almost criminal in its negligence. They simply left it too late. They should have taken it as soon as Afridi came to the crease. Why? Because he doesn’t really change his game whether the field is in or out anyway so you might as well give him every chance of succeeding with the Powerplay. It’s not like Afridi is going to be patient enough to wait for the Powerplay so why waste his hitting power?

Another reason why I think the Powerplay is wasted in the last few overs is because that’s a period of the game when teams score quickly anyway. More often than not, most teams press the accelerator pedal in the last 10 overs so the scoring rate tends to scoot along, regardless of field placements. With short boundaries and powerful cricket bats, batsmen have no trouble clearing boundaries, often hitting the ball way back into the stands. It wouldn’t have mattered if there was a fielder on the fence or not. This tends to happen naturally in the slog overs so why waste the Powerplay when batsmen will clear the ropes with or without field restrictions?

It is a new innovation so we need to allow captains and coaches time to figure it out I suppose. My guess is that we’ll start to see teams employing the batting Powerplay a bit earlier in the innings, perhaps with the new ball that is taken in the 35th over. If the innings gets off to a rollicking start, it would make perfect sense to take it in the 15th over because that effectively forces the fielding captain to change his bowling rota. On pitches that don’t help spinners, he might be forced to bowl out one of his quicks in those consecutive Powerplays which then leaves him massively exposed in the death overs when his lesser bowlers may have to close out the innings. At that point, the batting side may not even need a Powerplay to score heavily against the fifth bowler or a spinner.

It’s fascinating to watch evolution unfold in front of our very eyes. It’s like watching naughty schoolboys in the chemistry lab – nervously mixing a bit of this and a bit of that and then watching anxiously to see what happens. My prediction for the future is that fewer teams will take their batting Powerplays so late in the innings. A bit like the global financial crisis, artificial stimulus packages will take the form of early intervention.

Samir wrote recently about his problem in adjusting to the idea that a team allegedly representing Delhi had a load of foreigners in it. Here in England, this is not exactly a novelty, since most counties have had overseas players for forty years - even Yorkshire relaxed its Yorkshire-born-only rule nearly twenty years ago.

There are probably still a few diehards hanging around among the membership of every county who think the use of overseas players is immoral or unpatriotic, but the vast majority have completely adjusted to the idea of adopting someone from abroad as one of their own.

Winning things for the team is a fantastic way of breaking the ice: people can forgive a great deal in someone’s background if they are instrumental in bringing silverware or even just winning a few games. Having captained Yorkshire to their first championship in thirty years, Australian Darren Lehmann has a plaque in his honour on the West Stand at Headingley. If parochial Yorkshire can take an Aussie to their bosom, anyone can.

County sides now have players from three sources: home-grown players who have come up through the county’s youth system, players who were previously on another county’s books, and imports from abroad. If you have no other source of information, you can work out which category a new player falls into by listening to the comments from the members as he trudges back after being out for a scratchy thirteen.

They have patience with the promising young lad from the second eleven: he looked as though he was trying or did not have a lot of luck – but maybe he’s not really ready for the first team yet. And they are much quicker to welcome his arrival as a worthy player: a couple of fifties and a maiden hundred are quite enough to ensure a gaggle of admirers at the next supporters’ evening.

Those who previously tried elsewhere cause Playfairs to be extracted from pockets and consulted as to the previous record, after which comes “I don’t know why they keep getting us these Hampshire rejects. They’re never any good. Remember Kevin Shine? He was bloody awful too.”

Unless the English import has been poached by dangling large salary cheques in his face, in which case he might as well be an overseas player. By definition (at least in the supporter’s mind), overseas players get paid barrowloads of money which they probably wouldn’t deserve even if they were Donald Bradman and SF Barnes rolled into one. Resentment that this hyped-up popinjay is taking the county for a luxuriously-upholstered ride grows quickly, and you can hear knots of supporters expressing a fierce pleasure when he fails again “because at least we’ll get shot of him for next season.”

On the other hand, the class import may well have enough ability to win hearts and minds immediately. I missed Phil Hughes’s rapid hundred for Middlesex last Thursday, but those who saw it were quick to say that he had been “awesome”. I got to see him make 65* on Saturday and another 74 on Sunday, and I too was impressed.

I also worked out how England could counter him in the Ashes, but as I explained my theory about the field to set, one of my companions spotted a rather big objection: the Laws do not actually permit a 12-3 offside field. Well, that’s a problem for later. In the meantime, he’s playing for Middlesex and is due to open with Andrew Strauss in the game which may or may not start tomorrow depending on the weather. I hope he enjoys the Southgate pitch.

Oh dear. It seems that Michael Vaughan has battuus interruptus, otherwise known as premature dismissal syndrome, that often embarrassing condition to which stylish batsmen are peculiarly vulnerable. It is very easy to spot the afflicted: they walk confidently out to bat and begin with a few sweetly-timed boundaries but then get out for not very many, and the onlookers who were contentedly setting themselves down to savour some delectable batting haute cuisine get no more than a mouthful before an over-zealous waiter whips their plates away.

Even though today’s innings was probably cut short by an over-zealous umpire, Vaughan’s chances of appearing in the Tests this summer are receding daily. Which means that those of us who were hoping that Headingley would resound in July to the Barmy Army’s version of “Kumbaya” while the former captain’s cover drive simultaneously completes his hundred and clinches the Ashes are liable to become very boring as we intone sentences beginning “If only …” at every conceivable opportunity, so be warned.

On the other hand, we have this week heard the welcome news that, barring unforeseen disasters, he intends to play cricket next summer (at least) whether or not he gets picked for England along the way.

That declaration of intent presumably contains a bit of selector-nudging, since he would understand that the Strauss-Flower regime might prefer to go with the batsman who certainly has a future rather than an imminent retiree if it comes down to a toss-up between two plausible candidates, but since he said it to the Yorkshire club magazine, it really amounts to a promise to play on in first-class cricket after his international career is over.

It’s not that he needs the money. As a senior professional of considerable stature he could expect a pretty decent wage for playing county cricket, but he would probably get a similar amount from the former-England-captain pension scheme run by Sky TV, which involves a great deal less effort even after taking into account the bother of having to share the occasional commentary stint with Sir Ian Botham.

There are plenty of reasons to decry the English system as bloated, but in its favour is the opportunity that young players get of playing with and against players whose exploits they marvelled at when they were kids and learning from their experience. There is probably a lad in the Hampshire dressing room whose earliest cricket memory is of Dominic Cork laying waste to West Indians in 1994, and now there is the man himself just across the dressing room. Not so much a dream coming true as fantasy made real.

The truth of “class is permanent” is nowhere better demonstrated than on the county grounds of England. The reactions may have slowed a little, the eyes may be less sharp, but most of the veterans are capable of stepping up to something near their former best for at least the odd innings or bowling spell; even when they are in cruise mode you can usually see that they were once a cut above the rest.

So, since I’ve lost faith that he will return and win us the Ashes, here’s hoping that Michael Vaughan gets over the battuus interruptus, his zest for the game remains undimmed and the knee holds up for several years. Unless, that is, the likes of Joe Sayers, Adam Lyth and Andrew Gale improve enough to insist on being picked for Yorkshire ahead of him.

Having stayed up all night to watch the final episode of a long mini-series that spanned five months, it was fitting that the final ODI in Johannesburg stuck to the overall script. A see-saw battle, two evenly matched teams, constant momentum shifts and well-set batsman giving their wicket away to trigger mini-collapses.

It was pretty much the tale of the summer. The Tests finished deadlocked at three apiece whilst SA were clearly the better ODI team but of the 20 games these sides played against each other since December (Tests, ODI and T20), nearly all of them had a similar script. It was characterised by batsmen who threw away good starts and precipitated momentum shifts that ultimately swung games. Ironically, it was also a period where the most unlikely batsmen also changed the entire course of a game with some stunning hitting. Duminy, Steyn, De Villiers and Albie Morkel featured for South Africa. Johnson and Hughes stood out for Australia in that regard.

For Australia, I suspect these last few months have raised some questions that have no immediate answers. On the positive side, it looks like the search for Hayden’s replacement is over, the fearless Hughes nailing that door shut behind him. Johnson is on the cusp of becoming a genuine Test all-rounder (although surprisingly, his batting in ODI cricket is abject) and Haddin seems to have finally settled into the void left by Gilchrist. With Lee and Stuart Clarke still to return, there’s plenty of blue sky in that respect.

On the other hand, some things are still as clear as mud. Australia’s ODI game plan is the first thing that comes to mind. Most of the summer, even against NZ, they were tactically outplayed. The batting powerplay rarely worked and the middle period of their innings, batting and bowling, was consistently the period when SA (and NZ) took the game away from Australia. Their poor batting against Botha, van der Merve and Vettori in those middle overs must be a worrying sign for when they come up against even better spinners in spin-friendly conditions. Their bowling, for so long controlled in that crucial 15-40 over stage through the likes of Warne, Hogg, Symonds etc, looked utterly impotent this season. Both SA and NZ plundered at will, setting themselves up for their powerplay whereas Australia kept losing wickets to the spinners and delaying the powerplay until it had to be taken with the tail. This issue with the powerplay is one area that Australia cannot afford to keep messing up, such is the game-changing impact it has on the modern game.

To make matters worse, Ponting is no longer the all-conquering player he once was. His pedigree or greatness cannot be doubted but hard hands, playing in front of his body against Botha and chipping to midwicket or back to the bowler was an all-too-common sight during the ODI’s. It is a measure of how much Australia relies on him that their worst recent period in recent ODI's has coincided with his form slump in coloured clothing. Michael Hussey too now knows what it’s like to be back with the mere mortals and he may well find that his sibling rivalry is over for the time being. Despite numerous chances, David Hussey may just be one step out of his depth at this level. His unusual technique, lacking in footwork and relying on fast hands may not suit the higher demands of international cricket whilst his modest off-spin was dismissed over midwicket by most good batsmen.

Australia could justifiably argue of course that they were slightly the better team in Test cricket but that argument would need to be based on the theory that they were on top for 5 of the 6 Tests and if not for some stunning comebacks engineered by De Villiers, Duminy, Steyn and others, the Tests could have finished at 5-1. The reality though is that SA not only retrieved perilous situations but counter-attacked with enough force to go on and win these games. I think the final result in all three forms of the game probably tells the true story. One team is going through a rebuilding phase and looking for new talent whilst the other team is possibly nearing the top of their game with a few players like De Villiers, Steyn, Duminy and Botha very much at the zenith of their form and talent. Kallis’ consistency was a major rock for the Africans to lean on but the big scores never really materialised, often caught in the slips or gully, driving away from his body when he looked totally at ease.

The last game at the Wanderers was typical of the entire season really. One team storms out of the blocks, the other team doesn’t just peg them back, they actually emerge as comfortable favourites before yet another twist wrenches the game violently back in the other direction. Watching the game through bleary eyes at 4 am, willing myself to stay awake, the only thing I could confidently predict was that it would be unpredictable. And so it came to pass....

Wouldn’t it be good to see a three-cornered contest next summer with India, South Africa and Australia all playing each other at home and away in all forms of the game? My gut feeling is that India’s overall balance will probably see them finish on top, based on current form. They seem to have a squad that can cover all conditions with a deft mix of power, experience, youth and hunger. It's a close-run thing though - what do you reckon?

Those who read my last piece will not be surprised that I thoroughly approve of the decision by Andrew Strauss and Geoff Miller that if Strauss plays any Twenty20 cricket this year, it will be for Middlesex - though whether the Twenty20 champions will want to pick someone rejected by a rotten side like England remains to be seen.

I admit to scepticism that he will be a success as a 50-over opener: his five Caribbean outings only produced one innings which was what the team required. On the other hand, once in five attempts is more than a fair number of other applicants have managed in their auditions, so I am very willing to be proved wrong about his batting because his leadership skills are an asset to a struggling ODI team.

So who should lead the Twenty20 side instead?

On looking at the preliminary squad, the question that immediately sprung out was what a 40-year-old was doing in the 30 for the Twenty20 unless he was there as a captaincy candidate. England could do a lot worse than appointing Shaun Udal: with Murali Kartik he formed the jaws of the vice Middlesex used to squeeze their opponents to death on the way to winning last year’s trophy, and he is now on his second county captaincy. The only thing against him is age, but he’s quite athletic enough to field competently in the one-saving ring.

But perhaps this is old-fashioned thinking.

The kneejerk reaction to the John Buchanan multi-captain theory was to rubbish it, but longer consideration suggests that there are a couple of worthwhile ideas contained in it.

The Kolkata IPL team has in the end reverted to the traditional appointment of a single captain in Brendon McCullum, who opens the batting. But when he succeeds, he is obviously going to be staying out in the middle while wickets fall at the other end. Twenty20 lends itself to tactical shuffling of batting orders, so I can definitely see the sense in giving the job of making those dugout calls to the batting coach (or head coach or whomever).

The Laws of Cricket require a single fielding captain for the umpires to warn or notify about things, and the IPL’s rules require one to blame for slow over rates, but nothing says that the same bloke has to do it every game. It is not surprising that an Australian coach should propose having no permanent captain because it was traditionally the Australian way to pick an XI and then appoint the captain from amongst their number. In a concentrated tournament like the IPL where you might well rest a designated captain for a game or two, it is not illogical to say in advance that you won’t know who is captain for any given game until after the XI has been selected.

How much of this was in Buchanan’s mind is unknowable. As a disciple of Sun Tzu, his proposal could just as easily have been designed to draw fire and divert attention from his real purpose, that of removing Sourav Ganguly from the captaincy. The last Australian coach who tried that ended up losing his job pretty quickly, and Buchanan is astute enough to realise that the same fate awaited if Kolkata’s coach attempted a frontal assault on the Prince of Kolkata.

But whatever his true intentions were, the central question he raised is a valid one. How important is continuity in captaincy? My initial reaction is that a campaign is best commanded by a single general, but I would be fascinated to read your views.

In a couple of days, I'm going to try a little experiment. I'm going to declare my allegiance to two cricket teams I've never given a damn about before and see if it gets me all worked up.

My loyalties as a cricket spectator are directed toward supporting India and Delhi. The former for all international games and the latter for domestic cricket; it has worked so far. For games involving other teams, a variety of other factors have always gelled to enable the identification of a clear-cut favorite. Growing up it meant the West Indies and Australia, two teams whose style of cricket promised plenty of attack and aggression. Later, it meant supporting the plucky Kiwis during their glory run in the 1980s. I cheered for the South Africans when they returned in the 1990s; it was an improbable return and demanded recognition. I cheered for Pakistan when Zaheer, Asif, Majid and Imran were my heroes. In domestic cricket, as in international cricket, the villains and the heroes were clearly defined: bold, bustling Delhi against those stodgy, tiffin-packing Bombay-wallahs. I identified with the Delhi players; they had gone to colleges I had heard about, they played in clubs with names that were familiar from the local newspapers. Heck, I even knew where they had grown up.

Last year, during the IPL's inaugural season, I found myself not caring about any of the teams performances. I didn't really care who won or lost, even though there was a Delhi team in the tournament. How could I ever get excited about it if true-blue locals weren't involved? Even though the Delhi team was largely made up of Delhi players, something about the overseas hires made it a bit fake. Part of the problem was that I hadn't subscribed for a broadcast package and so only read about the scores and the action after the games. The highlights seemed over-accelerated; the razzle-dazzle a bit jarring. But most importantly, where was all the nationalistic fervor that seemed to mark serious international cricket? Without it, cricket seemed to have lost a bit of bite. Sure, it was interesting to note Delhi players running up to McGrath and Asif to congratulate them on a wicket. But the tension of the games seemed artificial; how serious about the games could these players be, I thought, if an international game wasn't on the line?

I've lived for 21 years on the East Coast of the US, and have clear-cut favorites in all the New York teams: the Giants, the Jets, the Yankees, the Mets, the Knicks. But the constant rotation of players, the clear knowledge that these are players who could be playing somewhere else next year because of a better contractual deal ensures on my part a certain lack of attachment (and as a result, I don't buy into the contrived intra-New York rivalry either). Manny Ramirez should be playing for New York; he is from Washington Heights. But he plays for Los Angeles (and before that, for the RedSox!). Try as I might to reconcile myself with this fact intellectually, at some emotional level it means that I don't really get upset about the games' results. As someone pointed out a long time ago, cheering for large professional franchises in sport is a bit like cheering for Ford v. Chrysler.

But still, perhaps the city-based-professional-mercenary league is a good thing. Perhaps this detachment is required from the game. To be honest, after the incessantly nasty India-Australia spats of 2007-8, it was a bit of a relief to not have so many controversies lingering over every single game. And players play the game hard because they have professional pride and a competitive instinct (the hard-fought games in the EPL, the NFL or whatever else bear adequate testimony to this fact). Certainly, the IPL's games didn't seem to lack competitiveness; that I didn't get into them didn't mean the games weren't played hard and contested right down to the last ball.

So this year, I've gone ahead and purchased a broadband video package for the IPL. Ill try and cheer for the Delhi Daredevils and the Kings XI Punjab. I don't know if I'll get into it; I don't know if I'll be heartbroken if the Delhi Daredevils lose to the Mumbai Whatchmacallits. But it's worth a shot.

I do know one thing: I'll care much more about the T20 World Cup. And I'm still happy about the fact that in cricket, unlike any other sport, the bilateral international encounter still remains the pinnacle of the game.

Given the large number of responses to my previous post, I thought it only fair that I write some sort of response. I've tried to organize this into a series of questions and answers. More broadly, I would say that it doesn't really matter what my (or anyone else's) background is when it comes to writing on cricket or on anything else. What needs evaluation is the argument, not the person making the argument. Anyway, here we go.

1. You're just drawing on the benefits of hindsight. Why didn't you say this before? Actually, I did. On the third day of the Test before tea-time, I wrote in Eye-on-Cricket, "I'm glad that it has rained a bit at the Basin Reserve. And I hope someone has pointed out to MS Dhoni that it'll get darker an hour sooner there. For hopefully, this lunatic suggestion going around that India should just keep on batting, and batting and batting will die the quick death it deserves. Get the lead to 500 and declare, and give yourself time and plenty of runs on the board to set attacking fields and get the 20 wickets to win. Why imagine the Basin Reserve will remain sunny and dry till the end of the fifth day? And if you don't think you can win despite setting a target of 500 I'd suggest a hunt for the proverbial chullu-bhar". I followed this up with a post on the fourth day as well. I had hoped for a declaration on the third day. When India batted on, I gave them the benefit of the doubt, thinking that NZ might not have batted anyway, given the poor light. Perhaps they could declare overnight? But I also thought, that at most, please at most, don't bat more than an hour. In the end, India batted on for some 90 minutes. I had a bad feeling then, given the clouds hovering around over the Basin Reserve and given the light situation. Just a reminder, once again: India was up by 231 runs with nine wickets in hand at the end of the second day.

2. What would you have said if New Zealand would have chased down the 500? My post above should give the game away. Those of North Indian origin will recognize the reference in the last line of the post I quoted above (for the benefit of others, I was saying something like "you should drown yourself in a thimble-full of water if you can't defend 500 in the fourth
   innings"). I would have said the Indian bowlers were pathetic, that the fielders needed catching practice, because almost certainly some dropped catches would have helped the NZ team, and quite possibly I would have lambasted Dhoni's field placings, because he might have contributed to the disaster by panicky field settings. I would have also have congratulated
   the Kiwis for pulling off the well-nigh impossible. I wouldn't have criticized the declaration, that's for sure. I like attacking declarations.

3. History is irrelevant to what will happen in the future, surely? In the strict sense, yes. However, there is a reason why teams don't make big scores chasing in the fourth innings. The pressure factor is qualitatively different.

4. Captains can only pay attention to impending rain not to rain forecast the next day or day-after. Actually, they can and they should. The former, because forecasts are better now. The latter, because cricketing strategy demands it. Captains should be aware of local conditions. Any captain that doesn't plan on rain in New Zealand is being a bit naive. Should a captain touring India in the later part of the season not account for the fact that the afternoons get scorching hot, when thinking about whether to enforce the follow-on? How is that not planning around the weather? But let us discard this point for a second. Let's forget about planning for the rain. Should Dhoni have waited till the lead was over 600? My answer to that would still have been a No.

5. Do you think Dhoni should be fired as captain? No. I think he is a very good captain. He is pretty canny; he clearly inspires the team. I do think he is a better T20 and ODI captain than a Test captain. Perhaps he will get better as he gets used to the idea of winning tests. But he needs to snap out of a conservative mind-set before it becomes too deeply ingrained in him.

6. Lastly, have you ever played cricket or captained a team in your life? Yes; I captained Mathematics in the Inter-Departmental Competition at Hindu College in 1987. We lost in the first round to Chemistry.

	The much-predicted rain came down soon after lunch on the final day in Wellington © Getty Images

Joy to the world, an Indian team has won a Test series in New Zealand! Let earth receive her kings. Congratulations to the Indian team. And a resounding well-played to the Black Caps. But reactions to the lack of a result in the third Test, forced upon us by bad light, and a forecast-well-in-advance-rain-shower on the fifth day, puzzle me. For, Dileep Premchandran says: "I don't think you can plan for rain" and Sambit Bal says "You can't really plan around weather". As do a few comments on my regular blog. I must be living in some alternate universe (entirely possible, given that I'm in Kings County, New York State), but for as long I've watched and followed cricket, the one thing Test captains have always done is planned around the weather. They have sent out instructions to batsmen, telling them to hurry up because rain clouds are threatening; they have sent out instructions to batsmen telling them to hang in there because the rain clouds are threatening; they have hustled to get wickets or overs completed for the same reason; and lastly, they have always, always, thought about how much time could be lost to rain (or light, or morning dew) when planning a declaration, or indeed, other tactical moves.

At tea time on the third day of the third Test, when Laxman and Gambhir were walking off the field to have a cup of Dilmah Masala Chai (and possibly some complimentary batata vadas and dhoklas sent over by the local Indian tea-shop), India were 448 runs ahead of New Zealand. Let's just stop for a second and examine these figures again. At tea-time on the third day of a Test, the world's No. 3 Test team, had a lead larger than any target successfully chased in the fourth innings of some 1918 tests played in 132 years. Over the world's No. 8 team, one they had bowled out for 197 runs in the first innings of the same Test. Two days later, when the Indian team trooped off the field, they were still looking for the last New Zealand two wickets.

When all the various defences about Dhoni's canny captaincy, India's dismal overseas records, the lack of a series win in 40 years in New Zealand, and the apparent incapacity of captains to plan for the weather are done with, something is still a bit rank in all of this. Something was rotten in the fair city Wellington on Tuesday.

Why did Dhoni need 600 plus runs on the board? To set attacking fields? Why were 500 runs not enough? Because New Zealand had scored 600 runs in the first innings of the last Test? And if he wanted to set attacking fields then why didn't he set them? I didn't see fields that were consistently the hyper-aggressive fields that a captain with 600 runs on the board could set. (If you want to see aggressive fields for spinners and pacers alike, go find a video of Imran Khan's field settings during the 1982 series against England, his first as captain). If the idea was to get 600 runs on the board and go on all-out attack, then why was the Indian team's demeanour in the post-tea session on the fourth day that of giggling schoolboys? They didn't look like meanies that had put 600 runs on the board and were in your face thereafter. This slackness affected their catching as well; three catches went down on the fifth day itself. (Dileep Premchandran notes that had those been held, India would have won anyway; perhaps; but perhaps the reason they weren't held was that the team's mind wasn't fully set on winning the game as opposed to the series).

Dhoni wanted to save the match first. A win was a bonus. He didn't get it and it didn't matter to him. A series win was more important. Fair enough. Those are his objectives. But if he is going to be a truly different Indian Test captain, he will need to snap out of a conservative mind-set that has been characteristic of most that have preceded him. And part of the way to do it is to back yourself and your team to win in lots of different settings. That might include thinking that 500 runs in a fourth-innings chase is enough for most teams in the world. It has been for every team in every Test played thus far in the history of the game. That might also include backing your bowlers to not get worried if someone does attack them a bit during their fourth-innings chase. Such expressions of confidence go beyond making your own team more secure; they also send out a message to your opponents. Doing it the first time might be hard but it can rapidly become a habit. Try it, MSD. I think you'll like it. You have the team for it.

[Editor's Note: Samir will be posting a follow-up article responding to the comments.]

Australian cricket, even at the lowest levels, has always prided itself on team spirit. Regardless of personal differences, Australian cricket is famous for a fierce loyalty towards the captain and the notion that the team always comes first. I’ve seen it first-hand and cannot think of a time when any team I played for/against did not show this admirable trait. As a nation, we’ve even built an Anzac legend around this notion of mateship and unswerving loyalty.

I’ve just started reading 'Golden Boy' by Christian Ryan, a re-telling of the Kim Hughes era. The author describes it as “unairbrushed tale of Australian cricket in the Hughes mini-era” and it certainly lives up to that billing! I’ve rarely enjoyed a cricket book as much as this one, perhaps because I remember that period with great clarity and perhaps, because it destroys so many myths I had of that great ‘team spirit’ ethic in Australian cricket.

The fact that it is unauthorised is what makes it so interesting. No hidden agenda and no favourites – he just tells the story as seen through the eyes of all the players, administrators and media of that period. There’s an overall consistency to it that gives it authenticity. Too many people are singing from the same hymn sheet for the author to be too far off the truth.

What astounded me most was the complete lack of support afforded to Hughes from the Dennis Lillee/ Rod Marsh camp. I knew they were never best mates but to read of the open dissension and undermining of Hughes’ captaincy was an eye-opener. It went against everything that Australian cricket teams were meant to embody and it also made a mockery of the very public reputations of Lillee and Marsh as the ultimate team players. They may well have been that under the Chappells’ captaincy but readers are left with no doubt that both Lillee and Marsh did not remotely extend that courtesy to Hughes.

The 1981 Ashes Tour, affectionately referred to as Botham’s Ashes, was when it all came to a head. All those interviewed, including England players, were utterly clear in their memories that both Lillee and Marsh undermined the captain to the extent that there was almost a sense of delighting in his failure. It did not even appear to be a secret – it was just open dissent and there was a general admission that Hughes, despite his own faults, was left isolated and with no realistic chance of success. Lillee repeatedly tried to decapitate Hughes in the nets, a practice that astounded team-mates but rarely fazed Hughes apparently.

On reading this, my view of Marsh especially has undergone a major transformation. On and off the field, his contempt for Hughes is crystal clear. For example, he berated Hughes for hooking down fine leg’s throat at Edgbaston when Australia choked on a small chase. “Christ, a captain is supposed to lead by example” he said, conveniently forgetting his own hook shot dismissal in the famous collapse at Headingley in the previous Test (Willis’ 8/43) and then missing an ugly swipe across the line, just forty minutes before making that comment about the captain. That sort of hypocrisy was not lost on the rest of the team and one gets the impression that both Lillee and Marsh, still revered amongst The Greats, did their reputation no favours on that fateful Ashes Tour. In fact, it is testament to their greatness that their reputations were able to survive such a poisonous episode.

Mike Whitney tells a poignant story about dismissing Botham in his debut Test at Old Trafford, caught by Marsh and then being bemused when the ‘keeper did not even congratulate him, seen instead with a frown on his face as if secretly disappointed that Botham was out. Whitney admitted to being completely dumbfounded by this incident and it was a common tale of an unhappy team, completely opposite to just about every other Australian touring team I’ve read about.

I'm only halfway through the book but even though I haven't seen any reference to Shane Warne, it gave me a new insight into his personality. Despite his obvious disappointments, Warne was unfailingly loyal to Taylor, Waugh and Ponting (briefly to Gilchrist too). It made me realise that Warne’s contribution to the team was much more than his brilliant bowling. He was the sort of team man that Australian cricket’s legend is built around.

Of course, loyalty to the captain is not a uniquely Australian trait. Imran Khan and Arjuna Ranatunga famously harnessed this spirit in winning World Cups. The West Indies were magnificently united under Clive Lloyd and Viv Richards. Stephen Fleming brought out the best in modest NZ sides he captained, Saurav Ganguly was credited with similar support during his reign and MS Dhoni appears to have that same quality, despite the presence of senior players like Tendulkar, Ganguly, Dravid and Laxman in his team. In terms of seniority and legend status, they are no different really to the Lillee/Marsh dynasty that crippled Hughes.

Halfway through the book and loving it…..what has surprised me most thus far is that this short period of disquiet went against everything I’ve seen in dressing rooms in Australia, even in club cricket. Loyal to a fault, Australian cricketing culture is built around 100% support for the captain. It is something I admire enormously. It was just this period from the start of the Packer circus in 1977 to that famous Ashes series in 1981 when a nation seemingly betrayed itself.

Whichever of their number the cricketing gods deputed to oversee proceedings on England’s tour of West Indies has an evil sense of humour. He saw to it that the average Test side lost the series to the weak one, and then turned round and made the decent ODI side lose the series to the truly awful one. And then he caps it all by making Andrew Strauss the Player of the Series when everybody knows he shouldn’t be within a hundred miles of a one-day side.

Granted, Strauss’s innings to win the fourth ODI was a decent enough effort, but awarding him Player of the Series involves also giving him credit for the century he made in the second game. While he did not quite scale the heights of irrelevance reached by Gavaskar’s famous World Cup 36, giving him an award for it is like giving a safe driving medal to an ambulanceman who observes traffic lights and speed limits without worrying whether the casualty in the back will survive long enough to receive treatment.

But as his other three innings were what one expects from him in short-form cricket – scratch, scratch, miscued big shot, out – there may have been a deeper purpose behind the award, that of ensuring that he will think he is good at one-day cricket and continue to open England’s innings throughout the World Twenty20.

These days, everything eventually tracks back to the IPL, so my guess is that this ludicrous accolade was directed by a dirty tricks department reporting to Lalit Modi.

The first hint of this campaign of misinformation I spotted was a week ago, when a strange Indian gentleman claiming to be a journalist popped up in the Sky TV studio, ostensibly to make sage comments on the Test match going on in Napier. Everything he said on that subject sounded sensible, but he was then invited to talk about the ODI which had just finished in Barbados, and pronounced that the main fault with England’s one-day side was the bowling.

Being English, I can’t really be expected to understand one-day cricket, but that just seems plain wrong. Without wishing to go overboard with praise for the unworthy, surely the bowling is the least of England’s one-day problems. Broad and Anderson are making good progress as new ball bowlers, Flintoff is excellent both in the middle overs and at the death, and the rest of those on show usually manage to border on adequacy.

Modi’s man was clearly trying to divert attention away from England’s horrible batting, which remains as clueless as ever. Tellingly, the only games which England won on the field (as opposed to being handed victory by a West Indian clerical error) were ones in which they did not have to try and bat for 50 overs. Given the full ration, England panic as soon as they lose a couple of wickets and are six down and struggling before they know it.

West Indies perhaps rely a little too much on a Gayle blitz to launch their innings, leaving them slightly doubtful if he goes early, but Sarwan and especially Chanderpaul are adaptable and versatile enough to build good platforms and then accelerate. They are followed by Bravo and Pollard, who possess both the ability and the self-belief to marmalise defensive bowling from the off. England batsmen who try and emulate them unerringly pick the wrong ball to whack straight up in the air, but if that doesn’t work they fall back on their sorry judgement of runs to get themselves out.

The plan must be that the series win sufficiently blinds England to their own uselessness to allow the rest of the world to laugh at them come June. West Indians disappointed with the outcome, particularly those seeking to blame coach Dyson for the Duckworth-Lewis debacle in Guyana, should therefore realise that this wholly ridiculous and anomalous result was part of a much deeper strategic scheme to destabilise England by getting them to pick the wrong team again and again and again.

The wry smile on Chris Gayle’s face at the final presentation suggests to me that he is privy to the conspiracy and was thinking “mission accomplished”. Though the best team lost, it was for the greater good, and the rewards will be reaped when England crash out of the Twenty20 World Cup by losing to the Netherlands.

The West Indies-England ODI series has been a pretty scrappy affair, the games mostly being given away by incompetence rather than won by superior play. Even should the deciding match take place and be a humdinger, this will still not be a series many will wish to remember.

Except for one thing: the return of Dwayne Bravo to international cricket.

He is that rarity in West Indians, an allrounder. In their 80-year history as a Test team, they have only really had five: Learie Constantine, Gerry Gomez, Frank Worrell, Garry Sobers and now Bravo. Collis King was a very useful one-day allrounder, but it takes thinking very hard to come up with any other names unless you want to give the benefit of the doubt to the spin of Viv Richards, Carl Hooper or Chris Gayle – and I incline not to.

In the years after WW2, a popular call-and-response in the Caribbean was “Who de best cricketer in de West Indez? It’s Gerry Gomez!”

Gomez’s statistics don’t scream “megastar”, but he was a player of a very similar cast to Bravo – a medium pace bowler who batted at six or seven and one of the best fielders in the side, though Gomez caught close and Bravo is a run-saver. And calling Bravo the best player that West Indies have is at least plausible.

He does not take as many wickets as the other bowlers, nor does he score as many runs as those higher in the order, but then his contribution is more qualitative than quantitative. He is dangerous. A side may think they are getting on top, but then Bravo disabuses them of that notion, whether by getting rid of the partners in a stand of 140 in the first and second over of his spell, breaking the grip a bowler was tightening by smacking him for three fours and a six, or making a brilliant catch or direct-hit runout.

He is the action hero who drops out of a helicopter on to the roof of a moving car, slides in through the window, grabs the steering wheel and wrenches it into a U-turn with one hand while incapacitating the driver with the other.

Of course, it’s rare that stunts like that come at the end of the movie. All that has been achieved is a temporary advantage. Whether it is decisive will usually depend on whether the backup arrives in time to press that advantage home.

Under the indolent leadership of the somnambulistic Gayle, it is all too possible that the backup will finish their drinks and smoke a cigar before making their way to the scene in their own good time, but Bravo’s evident passion is at least partial insurance against such sloth. His committed enthusiasm ought to be infectious, but even when it isn’t his vocal displeasure at sloppiness in the field lashes the lazy into line.

It is most likely that his contributions will be recognised as decisive in the shorter forms of the game – if he has not done so already, he should commission a joiner to come up with a display case for all the Man-of-the-Match awards he is going to pick up – but he will also be the man who tipped close Tests West Indies way. Even though someone else gets the credit for a century or six-for, the crucial moment will have been when Bravo ran out Graeme Smith or smote Harbhajan Singh from the attack.

He is an exciting player in the best sense - he makes things happen and matches come alive when he is involved. It is good to welcome him back.