If you were listening to TMS during today’s tea break or have been reading his blogs, you will be well aware of Oli Broom’s solo-cycle to the Ashes in Australia. I am with him in Istanbul at the moment writing a feature for next month’s Wisden Cricketer.

I am not going to scoop myself but I wanted to give you a quick peek inside Oli’s trip. Eleven countries down on his way to Brisbane, he is almost through Europe – from Turkey he heads alone into the Middle East, Africa, Asia, the Far East and Australasia. For a Chartered Surveyor from Berkshire that is definitely the unknown.
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So you have to spin the ball to be a decent spinner, do you? Well, yes, but only occasionally if you go by Paul Harris’s success. Most spinners use the one that goes straight on as a surprise. If it works inversely, as in the case of Harris and as England discovered today, it is mighty effective.

Harris, who is among the top 10-ranked Test bowlers, isn’t easy to admire. He shuffles up to the wicket and then round comes the arm. It’s an action wholly lacking in mystery. Everyone wants a spinner to have a bit of mystery.

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Throwing a New Year’s Eve party and need something extra-special to wow your guests? If you can’t quite afford a cricketer to turn up, why not go for the next best thing and hire a look-a-like?

A quick trawl of agencies on the internet uncovered … not much really. Bizarrely there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of demand for a Tim Bresnan or Ryan Sidebottom impersonator.

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