Tuesday, October 16, 2001 Just over a month ago I was preparing for the holiday of a lifetime in California. Then September 11 happened. We were due to fly out on September 16, and my girlfriend and I agonised over whether the holiday should still go ahead. She said yes; I disagreed. In the end our flight was cancelled anyway, so the decision was taken out of our hands, a scenario which would probably suit England's cricketers just at the moment.

At the risk of elevating my holiday-that-never-was to self-important allegorical status, I can see where they're coming from. Questions I asked myself a month ago will be going through Nasser and co's heads now. Do we want to put our family and friends through the worry? Will it be fun, or just plain stressful? Is it worth the risk, however small? Why don't we go there another time, when everything has calmed down, and just go somewhere else for the time being? After all, it's only a game/holiday.

There are rational arguments to counter all of these points, and Sambit Bal made many of them persuasively yesterday, including the suggestion that the first two Tests could be moved away from Mohali and Ahmedabad, in the north-west of India near the Pakistan border. But these are not rational times, and it's a very human instinct to want to stay at home instead of heading off in the general direction of trouble. It isn't logical to lump India in with the middle-eastern melting-pot, but when the whole world's got the jitters, logic doesn't really come into it. Just look at the Australian rugby league team, who originally voted to cancel their tour of England before the decision was overturned.

The acid test in such matters is usually to ask yourself whether you'd be prepared to go yourself. But on this occasion the acid is neutralised. I probably would go to India at the moment, but I'm not an international cricketer, I wouldn't have my tour dictated by security concerns, and I wouldn't have to stand exposed in an open field for hours at a time. How can I even begin to tell England's cricketers whether they should stay or go?

It would be sad for the fans if this tour doesn't go ahead, and another nail in the coffin of India v England, which has taken place just once in the last 17 years. But these considerations are secondary to the concerns of the players and their families. No-one should be forced to travel to a country where -- rightly or wrongly -- they would feel twitchy, especially not for a game of cricket.

My girlfriend and I ended up spending two stress-free weeks in the Mediterranean. England, too, could re-schedule and go to the Caribbean this winter instead (assuming West Indies pull out of Sri Lanka). California will always be there. And so will India.

Lawrence Booth is assistant editor of Wisden Online. His English Angle appears on Wisden.com every week.

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