Opinions are divided and former Test captains Ray Illingworth and Kepler Wessels go head-to-head in the Vaughan debate before the squad's announced. Illingworth feels there's a definite vacancy for Vaughan at No.3, partly because there aren't any other suitable candidates. Read on in the Guardian.
He certainly wasn't right when he played for Yorkshire at the back end of last season and he wouldn't be right for Test cricket if his head was still in turmoil, but he looks refreshed and fit to me. If his knee is as good as it's ever going to be then he gets over the fitness hurdle that we have been preoccupied by for the past few years.
Wessels disagrees.
No team can carry a passenger in a Test series – even less so in an Ashes campaign. If Vaughan is selected on reputation rather than worth, it will give the Australia bowlers a point of focus and they will hunt him down ruthlessly. I'm sure Michael knows that he needs to score at least one hundred for Yorkshire before he can be seriously considered.
In the Independent, Stephen Brenkley writes that it's fairly clear that the selectors were determined to delay the announcement of the squad until Vaughan scored some runs.
The amendment was entirely sensible because while nothing much was likely to change, it gave everybody concerned more time for proper reflection as the season started. Not that the deferment as it applied to Vaughan was entirely fanciful. Enough has been said to suggest that people in high places think he can still perform a significant role – the coach Andy Flower and the captain Andrew Strauss among them – but he still needed some runs to lend any sort of validity to that belief.
RSS Feed
