There is nothing in all of sport quite like an Ashes series. For 36 days during our summer the best players in England and Australia will be tested to the very limits of their character and marrow. Their temperament and technique will be probed and stretched as never before. It is the ultimate assessment of both the man and the cricketer.
There are nowadays other comparisons to be made and conclusions to be drawn in a cricket series between the two countries. For ages those of us who regularly visit Australia and admire the forthright manner in which they organise and play the game have been urging English cricket to follow suit. How is it a country with the population of Greater London and a handful of profes- sional cricketers can out-perform a country with more than 60 million people and 500 professional players? It is not difficult to answer. Australia have a better system from school to Test team than we have. In fact it is the difference between a country which has a system and one that doesn't.
There has been much talk of late that we are aware of the problem and are going to do something about it. I don't see any movement. Let us first of all look at the instrument of change. The Test and County Cricket Board (TCCB) have become the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB). This is a bit like replacing a ventriloquist's doll with a glove puppet. The manipulating hand still belongs to the counties. The new England management committee are supposed to be less parochial and more imaginative. Yet it is stuffed so full of Essex members the ECB should stand for the Essex Cricket Board. There has been a strong Essex influence at Lord's in recent years and a fat lot of good that has been.
Moreover, if we are to have a fresh approach, what on earth is Doug Insole doing on the committee? Now I have a particular soft spot for Mr Insole, based mainly on his love of movies and jazz, but not even his greatest friend would call him a radical and at the age of 70 he is unlikely to change. It is said he has been co-opted to continue his role as planner of England's overseas tours. If he is the man responsible for the tour to Zimbabwe in the rainy season he ought to be kept as far away from the job as possible.
Much is made of the dynamic duo Lord MacLaurin and Tim Lamb, the Batman and Robin of cricket. When you ask people why they are excited at having these two in charge they always go on about Lord MacLaurin being a successful businessman and Tim Lamb being a decent chap. Both observations have merit, but I have to say that their utterances so far have done nothing but fill me with despair.
Lord MacLaurin intends to send the England squad on an outward bound course before the Ashes series. This will help team bonding and develop character. Players will also be given advice about choosing agents, taking a broader and more sympathetic view of other cultures when on tour, and dealing with the media. I hope John Barclay, the England tour manager, takes advantage of this initiative. In recent television interviews he has about him the bemused look of a man recently shipwrecked who has fetched up in some strange land he knows not what of. Either that or he has been bitten by a vampire.
NOW while this talk of rugged training courses sounds very gung ho I doubt if it begins to address the problem of why we produce fewer Test quality cricketers than Australia or, judging by recent results, South Africa, Pakistan and the West Indies, not to mention Sri Lanka. Let me put it another way. Let us suppose Lord MacLaurin, as boss of Tesco, was getting poor service from a company supplying him with tomatoes. Would he send the bosses on an outward bound course to put things right? I think not. More likely he would kick a few people up the backside and change the system from producing bad tomatoes to making good ones.
I suspect like most successful men Lord MacLaurin's success is based on making important unilateral decisions as much as being a team man. If that is the case he is the right man in the wrong job. There has to be radical change and it must be done quickly, but from what Tim Lamb has said it seems unlikely that anything significant will take place for another couple of years, by which time it might well be too late.
Talking about his plans for summer rugby the other day Frank Warren, the promoter, was asked if he worried about competition from cricket. Warren laughed at the suggestion. ``Fewer and fewer peo- ple care about cricket,'' he said. I think he's right.
The series against the Aussies will give a false impression of cricket's status and provide an effective smokescreen for incompetence and inertia at Lord's and a rotting infrastructure throughout the land. What we need is positive action. What we have are working parties, committees and, God help us, management courses. Oh my Tony and my Kerry of not so long ago.