Two to Follow

With the county season under way - in the type of weather which probably won't be seen again for months - players are immediately stepping forward to show their hands.

It's well-known that the England selectors are partial to the odd player born outside the UK, and, while they've tended to come from South Africa rather than New Zealand in recent years, it's been obvious for a while that Ben Stokes has something, and his six cheap wickets and a brutal century for Durham at the Rose Bowl over the weekend underlined his potential. I think it's probably too early to regard him as a serious contender for the England side, but he's on the radar, and he won't be going away anytime soon.

Adil Rashid is better known. His eleven wickets for Yorkshire in their crushing away win over Worcestershire may have indicated that he's taken a few steps forward since last season - and his experiences playing for South Australia won't have done him any harm - but he'll need a lot more of the same to convince the selectors that he's worth a punt. Especially as Graeme Swann is one of the first names on the England team-sheet and they're not exactly lacking in seam-bowling strength either.

Isn't it great to have a decent English leggie to keep an eye on, though?

Suspension of Doubt

With the World T20 grabbing the headlines it's been easy to overlook the fact that the County Championship has been jogging along in the background for the last couple of weeks.

Durham are top, and both Steve Harmison and Graham Onions have been in the wickets. Patrick, at Line and Length, reflects on some of the questions which their successes pose.

I'm not sure that I agree with Patrick about Harmison being 'too soft' (although he really should be wary of saying things like that with the media around). However, doubts about the clarity of his mentality will never be far from the surface when an England team is about to be chosen and the doubts are perhaps stacked a little higher than the hopes these days.

Onions is the coming man, having bowled well against the inept West Indians, but, more importantly, having carried on taking wickets since. I have a feeling that he's probably a little ahead of Harmison in the running just now.

Elsewhere, while it seems perverse to invoke the example of a Twenty20 tournament when selecting a Test team, the fact that Adil Rashid generally showed up well, coupled with the fact that Panesar continues to struggle for his county, means that the Yorkshireman is surely the front-runner to partner Graeme Swann if England do decide to play two spinners in Cardiff.

Dangerous State of Mind

England have been losing one-day matches of varying shades, to varying opponents, for almost as long as I've been alive.

There are always a range of causes (or excuses) for this - too much cricket, too little cricket, too much exposure to the wrong sort of cricket, too little to the right sort, poor technique, lack of application, too much confidence, too little confidence.

One unwelcome characteristic which the typical English professional cricketer has always seemed to me to have in bucketloads is the ability to look down on people who they don't consider to be as good as them; people who play 'club' or even worse, 'village' cricket. Amateurs. Like the Dutch.

True to form I think England took the Dutch lightly on Friday, with their clumsy team selection giving the game away. Why on earth have Robert Key (and an out-of form Robert Key at that), a specialist opener in all forms of the game, batting at six when what was needed down the order was someone who could blast the ball out of the park, such as Dimi Mascarenhas (whom I would favour as he's done it before at international level) or Graham Napier? And why was Rashid playing? He's not a regular in his county's Twenty20 side and I'm sure that in the long term his best forms of the game are likely to prove to be the longer ones.

The answers lie in the fact that England were - perhaps only subconsciously, but that doesn't alter the argument - treating their game against Holland as another warm-up match, a sideshow and a prelude to the matches that really mattered.

It's a dangerous state of mind to get into as it can sap the will to win and affect players' techniques and decision-making, and England, of all one-day teams, ought to be immune to it

Now, if they don't win today, there won't be any more matches.

Autumn Questions

Travelling back from London on the train late yesterday afternoon, with the sky darkening and the wind getting up after a truly sublime weekend's weather, it was hard to avoid the feeling that autumn was setting in. Of course, another sign that time's moving on is the fact that the English first-class season's over (and congratulations to Durham, by the way) and tour parties are being announced.

There were few surprises in the England squads; I was pleased to see Shah selected ahead of Bopara (and Swann of Rashid), and it had already been leaked to the media that Vaughan, despite his renewed central contract, was set to be 'rested'. James Foster was, of course, completely ignored. This was predictable, but still hugely disappointing. While, on balance, it looks fair enough to give Matt Prior (much the best batsman of the available keepers) another chance, should we not be looking beyond Ambrose for an alternative?

A few years ago Chris Read was in a similar position, but he at least got another chance (even if it was against the coach's better judgement) before being jettisoned for good. It seems very much as though Foster, not seen in England colours since 2002 and an immeasurably better keeper than he was then, isn't even going to get that. Foster's made the standard noises about going back to his county and working hard, and I'm sure he will, but the signs are that none of it will ever do any good.

By contrast, the news that Vaughan isn't going looks like a brief triumph for common sense, although it still seems as though the likes of Geoff Miller (whose opinion matters) and Darren Gough (whose doesn't, frankly) feel that it's only a matter of time before normal service is resumed.

But why? Might there not at least be a chance - which nobody seems prepared to admit - that Vaughan, rising 34 and with a chronic injury history, is past it as a batsman and isn't coming back?

Yorkshire Born

While England were disposing of an insipid New Zealand side at Trent Bridge, I took myself off to one of my regular haunts - the Ian Botham Stand at Taunton - for the first couple of days of Somerset's match with Yorkshire. Although I saw Jacques Rudolph compile an excellent 155 on the first day and had the less pleasant experience of watching Somerset subside on the second, my main motivation was to take a close look at Adil Rashid, a player I've often written about over the last couple of years.

His staccato and uncomfortable innings of 5, late on the first day, didn't show him in a very good light, but he bowled a neat spell of accurate and wristy leg spin yesterday, part of a tight Yorkshire performance in the field which put Somerset on the back foot. Assisted by Anthony McGrath's thoughtful and innovative captaincy, Rashid (pictured above) looked for all the world like a spinner forged in the backstreets of Calcutta or Karachi, rather than Bradford, and I'm absolutely certain that more will be heard of him.

The lastest news from Taunton is that Somerset have hit back with the ball today and Yorkshire are currently 158 for 7, 272 ahead. With the weather set fair for tomorrow, a compelling last day beckons.

Crucial

I haven't posted for a while. Although the IPL's rocking along in India I haven't seen any of it and it doesn't feel to me as though the season's really begun here. I am, however, hoping to get up to Taunton this week (weather, as always, permitting) for some of Somerset's County Championship match with Hampshire, which begins on Wednesday.

A batsman who I'm looking forward to seeing is Somerset's talented 23 year-old, James Hildreth, for whom this is a crucial season. In common with most other observers down here in the English south-west I have little doubt that he's got what it takes, in terms of basic talent and temperament, to succeed at the very highest level. Owing to a sluggish start he wasn't given the opportunity to really display his wares on the England Lions tour of India during the winter, with the consequence that he won't be lining up with the rest of the hopefuls when the New Zealand tourists arrive in Southampton later this week.

He, however, has already visited Southampton, making 112* to take Somerset to victory, chasing 287, in the Friends Provident Trophy on Friday evening. By all accounts it was an excellent knock and one which should, at least, remind the selectors of his existence.

Some more where that came from, especially in the limited-over game, could lead to Hildreth being the latest player to be introduced to the international scene via the perenially transitional England one-day side, although players who were given more opportunities than him in India and who achieved more (Carberry, Rashid of course) are nearer the front of the queue and will be facing the Black Caps on Thursday, while Hildreth lines up against the even less threatening Hampshire attack.

Disappointing, both for those of us who follow him and, I'm sure, James himself, but, with his real long-term ambition and destiny being a place in the Test side, County Championship runs are vital.

I, for one, hope he can deliver.

Coming from Behind

As one of those English eccentrics (are there any others?) who always follows the Indian domestic season closely, even when the 'England Lions' don't feature in it, I was pleased to see England's second string finish up with a win over Central Zone after coming from behind.

While many people's attentions will inevitably be focussed on Panesar and the side's baby (and most promising player) Adil Rashid, it was good to see the usually unsung Middlesex seamer Alan Richardson take a number of economical wickets. It's very hard to work out why he was selected, since, at 32, his chances of carving out a prolonged career in the England attack are barely better than mine (well, quite a lot better, actually), but he's been a very useful and typically English operator for many seasons, initially in his native midlands and more recently at Lord's.

And then there's Michael Carberry, on his third county at 27, but just starting to shape up as an opener, with his second innings ton the major contribution to the English victory.

While the one-day circus gets under way again for England in New Zealand there's a bit happening elsewhere; the players are even wearing white.

Ones to Watch

As India, with Yuvraj to the fore once again, and Pakistan, taking advantage of a characteristically insipid semi-final performance from New Zealand, set up a sub-continental Twenty20 final in Johannesburg tomorrow, the English County Championship came to a thrilling climax yesterday.

I spent the afternoon watching on TV as Lancashire mounted a sustained assault on the score of 489 which they'd been set to beat Surrey at The Oval and win the title for the first time since 1934. That they failed to do so by just 25 runs is an indication of how well they batted in typically benign Kennington conditions, with VVS Laxman, who made a swift, elegant century, and Stuart Law, combining to give Surrey (and Lancashire's principal championship rivals, Sussex) a major scare. Ultimately you had to feel that if the two major players had managed to stay together for a further hour then the total would have been reduced to a level from which it could have been knocked off with comparative ease. However, they didn't, it wasn't, and Sussex claimed the first division title for the third time in four years.

Down here in the west the talk is all of Somerset, who won the second division with a record total of 266 points. The best aspect of their final victory over Nottinghamshire, secured on Friday lunchtime by an innings and 121 runs, was that Notts were bowled out by a young English leg-spinner.

Michael Munday is 22, comes from Cornwall, and has been involved with Somerset's academy since he was a teenager. He's found it hard to break into their prodigiously successful side this season, but, given a rare opportunity on a wearing track at Taunton, finished the Notts second innings with 8 for 55 and the match with ten wickets.

Although I get to Taunton as often as I can I can't offer any specific comment on Munday as I've never seen him turn his arm over, but you have to like the fact that, after years of drought, there are now a couple of decent young English leg-spinners coming through. With the fact that he's played more first-class cricket and his unquestioned batting ability, the younger Adil Rashid is the only one of the two who's likely to be furrowing the brows of the England selectors anytime soon, but Munday, who spent last winter in Australia and has impressed no less a judge than Terry Jenner, is clearly one to watch.

I'm planning to see plenty of Somerset in Division One next season and will report back on what I see (which will hopefully include plenty of Munday).

Team Selection

After a winter of blunders on the team selection front the England selectors (not just Duncan this time) have come up with a useful England 'A' side to tour Bangladesh.

Good to see the great Steven Davies and Stuart Broad there; interesting also to see Nick Compton get in on the back of some heavy scoring for Middlesex last season and also Adil Rashid, the latest great leg-spin hope (who can bat as well).

Interesting Times

It's often seemed as though the cricket world's been going mad these last two weeks and I've been away in Derbyshire visiting my family, so I haven't managed to post anything for a while. Now that things are returning to normal (England are losing a One-Day International as I write) it seems as though it's time to jot down a few thoughts.

I haven't got much to say about England's continued problems in limited-over cricket apart from stating what seems to be obvious, namely that if they'd been up against the current Pakistan attack - with Shoaib Akhtar, Rana Naved-ul-Hasan and the massively impressive and skilful Mohammad Asif all firing - earlier in the summer, it seems highly unlikely that they would have won the Test series. In fact, in all probability they would have lost it and would be going to Australia having failed to win a series since the conclusion of the last Ashes contest. However, as the pros (and various other people, including me) always say, you can only beat what's put in front of you. This England did, but their uneasy and complacent performance at The Oval until they were let off the hook by Pakistan perhaps gave a clearer pointer to how tough things are likely to be in Australia than their comfortable wins at Old Trafford and Headingley.

Meanwhile, on the domestic scene, two tales from the last few days stand out. One, Graeme Hick (you may remember that I follow his career quite closely) scored two centuries for Worcestershire against Essex, and two, a pair of leg-spinners, Yorkshire's Mark Lawson (6-88) and Adil Rashid (4-96), bowled out Middlesex at Headingley.

The first time that's happened for a while, surely, but hopefully not the last.

Here is the News

Yesterday we had the regrettable, but somehow predictable, news that Andrew Flintoff's ankle injury was more serious than had first been thought (now where have I heard that before?) and that he will be having an operation this week. No more cricket for him this season and a hell of a battle to be fit for the Ashes series which starts in November.

Whether or not he's there it's becoming increasingly hard to see England retaining the Ashes. One short-term compensation: Ian Bell should stay in the side. He deserves to.

On Friday an 18 year-old leg-spinner called Adil Rashid took 6 for 67 on his debut to bowl Yorkshire to an innings victory over Warwickshire at Scarborough.

For more years than I care to remember people have been wondering when Yorkshire would have a regular, successful player from the county's vast Asian community.

Maybe Rashid is the man.