There are many different ways you can decide when your old captain is no longer useful.

Results.

Gut feeling.

Sex scandal.

Political unrest.

Or age.

But England has found an ingenious way to work out when to get rid of a captain.

Wait till Graeme Smith beats them down.

Then when Smithy has beaten them good and proper, said captain, filled with love of Queen and Country will perform professional seppuku.

It’s a perfect situation.

The newish chairman of selectors doesn’t have to make a decision.

The coach doesn’t have to make suggestions.

No one at board level needs to make rumblings.

The team don’t have to eat their own.

A dignified, proper, English, bloodless coup d’état.

And Smith is the perfect man for the job.

He is the man you bring in when you want to execute kittens.

Judging by Vaughan’s press conference, kitten is not far off.

So letting him take down the trousers of a dead man walking is not the worst thing that can happen.

Smith is a general that will never become king, so losing a captain or two to him will not affect English cricket in the long run.

Let him eat Vaughan, while England can start the arduous day-or-two-long journey to find a replacement.

Two questions remain, is playing South Africa every year overkill?

And is making KP captain the bravest decision ever, or the silliest?

Jrod is an Australian cricket blogger, his site Cricketwithballs.com won July’s Best of Blogs in TWC.