NatWest Series Final, Lord's, Saturday, July 13, 2002

What a great day. A fantastic match, a great pitch, great weather as well. All that was missing was an England victory, but that's the trouble with being captain – you rarely get a good day all round.

Obviously I am absolutely delighted to have made my first one-day century. I always felt that my career would be incomplete unless I managed one at some stage, and to do it in a final, and at Lord's as well, was almost a dream come true – all that was missing was a win to go with it.

I don't want anyone to misinterpret that gesture I made about my squad number. People may think I was directing it at the entire press box, but that wasn't the case – just one or two guys who know who they are. There's been a lot of talk about my position in the batting order – and I don't mind the point being made, it's fair enough to speculate. But it's the few who labour the point, and just go on and on about it, that irritate me. All it does is put you under pressure, but I was glad to answer the critics with a century from my favoured No. 3 spot.

We were very happy indeed to set a target of 326 – we've been batting well all tournament, and felt that today of all days we had to grab the bull by the horns. So we chose to bat first, even though received wisdom suggests that batting second is preferable at Lord's. When we had them 146 for 5 things were looking pretty rosy, but in the end our inexperience told, and we paid the price for our lack of mystery.

Yuvraj and Mohammad Kaif played exceptional innings, but we played into their hands to a certain extent. It's a mentality born of the greentops you find in county cricket, that the answer to any tight situation is to plug away at the back of a length and wait for the errors. Ronnie Irani has had a fantastic tournament, but at present he is little more than a line-and-length specialist – and it was only a matter of time before they found him out. Sehwag took a particular liking to him in his first over, while I was off the pitch, and smacked him for four fours.

One-day cricket is moving on so quickly that we cannot simply rely on those tactics – I'd give Ian Harvey of Gloucestershire as an example of how our seamers need to adapt. He mixes it all up, slower balls, yorkers and the like. All of our bowlers, and that includes the guys not playing here today, need to go away now and work on a bit of unorthodoxy.

I took a bit of a blow on the hand early in the Indian innings, but it's only a bruise – no fracture or anything. To be honest it was caused by a bout of cramp, as I completely seized up from the waist down and couldn't get my body down to the low balls. So I left the pitch immediately and went to sit in an ice bath for a couple of overs.

If we had managed to nip them out for 324, I think it's fair to say that this would have been the best weekend I've had for a long time. I was at Buckingham Palace yesterday to receive an OBE, which was a great honour and an proud occasion. All my family were there as well, which made it even more special, and it would have capped a great weekend if we had come away with a trophy today. Still, you can't have everything in life.

Obviously, the other news today is the retirement of Graham Thorpe from one-day internationals. It is a great shame, and I feel for him as he has not had an easy time recently. But at 32, he realised that he cannot do everything, and felt that his body couldn't take too much more pounding and diving.

The news is something that I've had to keep quiet for a few days now. Thorpey told me after three or four games, but we decided not to go public for fear of upsetting the squad morale. At the same time I felt it was important to get Michael Vaughan into the side at the earliest opportunity, to give him as much match practice as possible.

Of course, a silver lining is that, come the future, Thorpey will be rested up before the Test matches. He is still very much a pivotal member of our team.

Nasser Hussain was talking to Andrew Miller. His thoughts will appear on Wisden.com, other duties permitting, at the end of each day of England's international cricket this summer.

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