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“You find there is not much time to concentrate on cricket and it can become dispiriting” - Andrew Strauss

You think he’s describing your job, but he’s not. He’s describing what it’s like to be England captain. You’re lucky. You can concentrate on cricket in the form of this newsletter. You even look like you’re working while you read it.

This week’s…

Fad Resigning the England captaincy. To lose one England captain may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness. At least Kevin Pietersen’s yet to succumb to this dangerous craze.

Admirable look on the bright side Jacques Kallis after coming second in an epic confrontation with Andrew Flintoff: “People say that with Twenty20 around Test cricket is going to die. But I don’t think it’s anywhere near dying with people watching exciting afternoons like that. What more do you want?”

Ringing endorsement Andrew Strauss on his new captain: “We are going from having the best captain England has ever had to someone who has never done it before. It is hard to say if Kevin will ultimately be successful.”

Simple truth Geoff Boycott speaks about Vaughan prior to his resigning as captain: “The only way to stop people talking about his form is for him to make runs. You wouldn’t ask the question, nobody would think the question, nobody would be talking about it if he made more runs and if he looked like he was going to make runs.”

S4C live cricket on terrestrial TV

Impoverished cricket fans the nation over rejoiced this week at the news that S4C will broadcast five Glamorgan games live. Finally, cricket returns to terrestrial television. The new TV rights deal was perhaps best summed up by Vic Wakeling, managing director of Sky Sports:

“It was made clear to us that the ECB would encourage competition for individual Test series, or one-off Test matches. Sky has ended up with all the Test matches in each year of this new deal.”

Yep. And not just that. Every one-day international, every Twenty20 international and county cricket too – including both the Twenty20 competitions.

ECB chairman, Giles Clarke, was quick to lay the blame at the door of the BBC, who chose not to bid. Clarke claimed the BBC favoured less well-supported sports. He said: “Just how many people play Formula One?”

The BBC replied: “[Bidding] for live Test cricket is subject to value for money and ability to schedule. Neither of these criteria were met.”

Trouble is, it’s hard to see any party with any real intention of getting live cricket back on free-to-air television.

Pietersen keeps playing the leg glance

Kevin Pietersen says taking over the England captaincy won’t change the way he bats. Why not? Everything else does. The man sometimes decides he’s left-handed even while the bowler’s running in.

As well as Pietersen’s switch-hit, Patrick Kidd looks at a whole host of batting innovations in this month’s issue of The Wisden Cricketer, including that outrageously impertinent shot, the leg glance.

The 1897 Wisden Almanack said: “For any ordinary player to attempt to turn good-length balls off the middle stump as [Ranjitsinjhi] does would be futile and disastrous.” This is partly how Ranji acquired his reputation as an elegant and stylish batsman. The very same shot has earned Paul Collingwood his reputation as a laboured pragmatist who looks like he’s shovelling coal.

Worried that a great swathe of the nation’s youth can’t watch Andrew Flintoff bowling live? Worried that a small minority of the nation’s youth might again catch sight of Alastair Cook bowling live? Email [email protected]