The one massive bright spark that came out of a pretty dull and dreary Test match, mainly due to the weather of course, was the return to form with a cracking hundred of England’s leader Michael Vaughan.  The captain has been under scrutiny from various parts of the media over the past two or three months and of course the best way to answer this criticism is by scoring heavily out on the pitch, so his hundred was the perfect answer.  From a batting perspective it looks like one or two players are in need of a decent long innings and to that end I am sure New Zealand may sniff a little bit of brittleness in our batting order.

The bowling unit on the other hand, I think, looks like it is gaining confidence with each game they play together and with glaring weaknesses at the top of the New Zealand order, Messrs Sidebottom, Anderson and Broad will be licking their lips at the prospect of a bouncy Old Trafford Test match wicket.

On another note, I spent last week in India and sampled a couple of IPL games, one in Kolkata and the other in Mumbai.  There were over 60,000 on Tuesday night and over 40,000 on Wednesday night, so as you can imagine the atmosphere in both grounds was sensational.  If you think Premiership football is big here, then times it by three or four and that is how big the IPL is in India.  The media coverage and hype was immense and this was all backed up with a fantastic product on the field. 

Tuesday night, I watched Shoaib Akhtar’s first game and his four wickets helping the Knight Riders overcome the Delhi Dare Devils.  On Wednesday night in Mumbai, I watched Sachin Tendulkar make his first appearance for his home town team and he inspired team mate Sanath Jayasuriya so much that he hit eleven sixes in his unbelievable undefeated hundred.  Make no mistake the IPL is here to stay and let’s hope the powers that be can soon make timing schedules so that England’s finest can go and sample this intoxicating atmosphere.