Shane Warne possessed a fast bowler's aggression in a slow bowler's skin © Getty Images

I seem to have been talking about Shane Warne all day, to people who know lots about cricket, and many who don’t, because he was the cricketer of whom everyone had heard, and on whom everyone held an opinion. My mum had a view on Warne. The girl at the post office and the guy at the servo, who know I’m into cricket, wanted to talk about him. I didn’t get to the presser because I had to field talkback calls about him on the ABC: it is fair to say that there was a wide range of very emphatic views.

It was said of Augustus that he found Rome brick and left it marble:
the same is true of Warne and spin bowling. But just because Warne has done it with such apparent ease, noone should underestimate the degree of difficulty involved. Have you tried to bowl a leg-break? I’ve been playing club cricket since I was nine, and I would give anything to be able to bowl a proper one, but they either hurtle into the ground or fly off into outer space like a malfunctioning satellite. Yet Warne can drop them as precisely as a dragon fly alighting on a lily pad.

Warne was mandated by nature to bowl slow. He has a surprisingly gentle handshake, but you can feel the strength in those big fingers. He has broad shoulders and a powerful back leg drive, so that he almost body surfs into his delivery: the contrast is MacGill who does most of his work with his arm. And that action – so simple, so grooved, so efficient. It is nothing other than a miracle of coordination.

Above all, perhaps, is the mentality: that fast bowler's aggression in a slow bowler's skin. All the Warne books in my library seem to feature a cover shot of him appealing. If you knew no better, you'd think they were the work of a bowler who tried to bust open people's heads for a living. He only threatened eardrums.

What a combination. If you doubt this, check the landscape. It’s often stated that Warne made every kid in Australia want to bowl leggers. Warne says in ‘My Illustrated Career’: ‘My biggest contribution has been to make slow bowling exciting and even fashionable.’ But MacGill is still the second-best leg spinner in Australia, and Cameron White and Cullen Bailey do not a renaissance make. It might be exciting. It might be fashionable. But it’s no easier.

More over at Guardian Unlimited, if you're interested.

Cricinfo is reporting that former Test stars are ‘shocked’ by Channel Nine’s foretelling of Shane Warne’s retirement. They believe that he could go on for yonks – and in that they’re probably right. But that’s not the point. Desire in this case, I suspect, is more significant than ability. He’s not the messiah, of course – just a very naughty boy. Yet on the half-dozen or so occasions I’ve interviewed him, Warne has spoken about his family with unfeigned sincerity. At the risk of emulating E. W. Swanton’s habit of quoting himself, these are some lines I wrote about Warne for the Guardian back in October:

‘The imponderable in Warne’s considerations is his personal future, now delicately poised, with he and Simone maintaining a loose orbit round one another and their children, but passionately protective of their privacy. Warne was incensed when a female television journalist accosted him after his dismissal at the WACA Ground to voice rumours they had reconciled: a brave move without a helmet. A more ‘up close and personal’ cricket coverage has been mooted for this summer’s Ashes, with the revival of the old boundary-edge interview. Warne may be tempted to issue press releases instead.

‘What keeps Warne going? This summer, it’s probable he will pass 1000 international wickets: he has 978, composed of 685 from 140 Tests and 293 from 194 limited-overs games. But his great rival for bowling’s blue riband, Muttiah Muralitharan, already has 1082, and with his edge in years will probably leave Warne’s records in his wake in due course. The Australian captaincy, too, is now, almost certainly, permanently out of reach.

‘The Ashes, then, looms disproportionately large in Warne’s plans – for, after that, even he probably does not know. Cricket has been a faithful recourse for Warne; when all else has gone pear-shaped, the game has always been there for him. But Warne, who grew up in the bosom of a loving home and family, might well be prepared to make sacrifices for one of his own. Perhaps, in due course, Warne will have a shock for us that is genuine and meaningful.’

I’ve written a lot about Warne this summer, mainly because I’ve had the sense that I should enjoy him while I can. Have just sent off a column to the Guardian about Warne, and also McGrath. More when the announcement is made official.