It’s often noted that even those meticulous planners, the mice, frequently have their schemes foiled by fate, so what chance have we got? We can only dream of murine levels of forward thinking, so it’s hardly surprising that our own plans often go awry.

More specifically, what chance have the England selectors got? At the close of the second day’s play, England’s bowling coach, Ottis Gibson, explained the selectors’ thinking in selecting Darren Pattinson. He then highlighted how their plan had been scuppered.

“Knowing what we might get in terms of conditions at Headingley, we went with him - but the conditions we’ve had haven’t really favoured him.”

England’s national selector, Geoff Miller, said: “What we’ve seen of him is ideal for these conditions and other conditions elsewhere.”

It’s most definitely desirable to have bowlers who can take advantage of particular conditions, but there has to be a Plan B. This is why Duncan Fletcher was always so adamant that his bowlers have extreme pace. When there aren’t helpful conditions for a bowler to exploit, it’s helpful to have at least one attribute that’s not condition-dependent.

It hasn’t been the ‘best laid plan’. You didn’t need a mouse to tell you that; a Hoggard or a Harmison could have said so - and subsequently did.