Cricket becomes fashionable to the English public once every four years © Getty Images

During the ICC World Twenty20, our esteemed editor was struck by the lack of hoopla as he strolled up to The Oval. There was little sign that a world championship was taking place, and he then went on to suggest that the ECB had concentrated on marketing the Ashes.

Well, maybe, except that if there is an event which the ECB do not have to market at all, it’s the Ashes. In the run-up to a series against anyone else, there are interviews with England players and tourists on the sports pages of the newspapers but as an Ashes series approaches, the features editors and news editors muscle in on the act, the players get interviewed by the same people who interview Hollywood stars and politicians and the results appear in the colour supplements and stories about the build-up appear in the news section. It is not the judgement of the ECB that the Ashes is the most important thing there is, but the view of news editors in what used to be Fleet Street.

	Martyn appears to be keen to join the list of cricketers who now view the John Buchanan era in a far less favourable light © Getty Images

With less than a week to go before the Ashes series begins, perhaps both teams might do us all the courtesy of telling us whether they think they are well prepared for the series or not? Anyone can make excuses after the event – let’s hear the truth before it all starts so that we can then judge the final outcome with all grudges and platitudes aired beforehand.

The graceful Damien Martyn, he of silken touch and impeccable balance with bat in hand, appears to lack that poise in a recent interview that is as clumsy as it is ungracious. In dissecting the 2005 Ashes loss, Martyn appears to be keen to join the list of cricketers who now view the John Buchanan era in a far less favourable light than at the height of the Australian dynasty.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m not here to defend Buchanan or any other coach for that matter. I’m firmly in the camp of those who think that this modern preoccupation with multiple coaches and support staff is a case of massive overkill. What is amusing though is the number of cricketers who seem to enjoy sinking the boot in to the easy target – the coach – after a series is completed and lost.

Samir Chopra wrote eloquently yesterday about his unease at the England team having a bonding session in the cemeteries of Flanders. I share many of his qualms, though not all, and have a few of my own.

One factor which mitigates the gimmickry aspect is that they did gather to lay a tribute at the grave of Charlie Blythe, one of cricket’s near-greats. There is something entirely appropriate about an England team paying collective homage to one of their fallen predecessors.

I can just about see the point of capturing that rite on film for posterity but the rest of the photo coverage was, I firmly agree with Samir, tasteless. The existence of the photographs means that there was an observer who was concentrating on taking pictures rather than paying his own respects to the war dead. And some of the photographs which have been published look posed, which would mean that the subject of the picture was breaking off from contemplating whatever thoughts the rows of gravestones occasioned to make sure that he would look good on camera.

	'I don't think sports teams should be using war cemeteries as venues for training' © Getty Images

I come from a military family (more precisely, of air force pilots). Thus, I'm generally inclined to agree with sentiments of recognition directed towards the service of war veterans, the commemoration of the war dead, and more broadly, with a sympathetic take on folks who serve in the military. Still, I would be lying if I did not say that both the Australian team's visit to Gallipoli in 2001, and the English team's visit to Flanders yesterday filled me with some unease.

What bothers me about these trips is the idea that paying a visit to war cemeteries or memorials is a "bonding exercise" for sportsmen about to engage in a major sporting encounter. This notion is deeply problematic on two counts.

First, it encourages a facile identification between sport and war (note, I'm not saying the visits do it - they just encourage it). This identification has already infected sports journalism - what with its language of "sporting battlefields", "fierce battles", "thrashings", "humiliating defeats", "gallant resistance", language that is the stuff of headlines and which often makes me cringe. Some of the borrowing of this language is unavoidable; I'm sure it slips into my blogging as well.
After all, sports is a competitive encounter with winners and losers; war is a "competitive encounter" as well. But there the similarity should end.

My recent post about Queensland replacing Western Australia as the production line for fast bowlers, got me thinking about why such patterns emerge and what factors may trigger change. Why has the West Indies’ factory come to such a shuddering halt for example? There was a time when some of the guys who could not make their first XI would have been snapped up by any other international team. Chaps like Sylvester Clarke, Wayne Daniel and Ezra Moseley were genuinely scary but couldn't regularly crack the top team.

As much as Australia and South Africa continue to churn out good quicks, why is it now the case that some of the best fast bowling talent is emerging from the subcontinent? It’s a much a cultural shift as anything else – fast bowlers are no longer viewed as the quick entrée before the main meal. Is it down to coaching, nutrition, equipment or even a change in the physique of the Asian male?

Just when I thought it was safe to assume that Shahid Afridi’s career as a genuine all-rounder was well and truly extinguished, he finds a maturity in his game that I was convinced he did not possess. Perhaps now, nigh on ten years after his stunning entry into the international game in Nairobi, we might yet see the sort of cricketer his talent always promised. If his last two Twenty20 innings is any indication of the new Afridi, strap yourselves in. This could be a wild ride!

The great irony of the Twenty20 triumph is that it now offers Afridi no more excuses for wasting his batting talents. For too long, he has taken refuge under the convenient umbrella of being classified, perhaps wrongly, of being a one-dimensional slogger. It has been an excuse that he has probably been only too happy to use because it afforded him immunity from those who tried to convince him that he was selling himself short by trying to slog every ball out of the ground. No more excuses Mr Afridi. We all know now that you’ve got the class, the patience and the shot selection to play much more meaningful innings than the brief cameos that you’ve become all-too-famous for.

Yesterday, Mike Holmans found the singing of the national anthems before the Women's Twenty20 final tear-inducing. And a week or so ago, Rob Steen wrote that the singing of the national anthems before the WC T20 games was a "tacky and transparent attempt to assert the primacy of the international game". But Rob is also someone, I think, who would like the primacy of the international game to be maintained (if I'm mistaken, please correct me). As someone who quite likes the national anthem ritual before sporting encounters, I feel obliged to throw in my tuppence.

Perhaps part of the reason Rob does not like the performance of the national anthem is because it is an overtly nationalistic gesture (in a time when a prima facie reaction to nationalism is that it is pretty darn unfashionable). Perhaps the disagreement is just about tactics. Rob might want to assert the primacy of the international game, he just doesn't want it done via the national anthem route. Fair enough. But I'd like to argue that national anthems aren't tacky and transparent and in fact, when it comes to trying to frame the international game in terms of some pomp and circumstance, it's a very good option (compared to the alternatives we have).

	It was a privilege to be able to stand in the Long Room and applaud a winning England team back to their dressing room © Getty Images

While the public stands were only sparsely occupied for the women’s ICC World Twenty20 Final, the Pavilion End was packed. Admittedly this was mostly because seating for MCC Members and their friends is unreserved so those wanting a good viewing spot for the afternoon’s proceedings were obliged to turn up early, but the prospect of seeing an England team in a final they were actually expected to win made this far less of an inconvenience.

I had not realised how much I cared about it until the national anthems. I had stood for them before the men’s games at Lord's, respectful but unmoved – except when the Pakistan and Sri Lanka teams stood interleaved with one another in solidarity before their group game – but as the British dirge struck up for the women, I felt the tears welling. Not that I hadn’t been paying attention to the women’s progress: when those headlines about Edwards being a doubt for the semi-final appeared on Cricinfo mid-week, my first reaction to was to panic about Charlotte’s availability for England rather than be concerned about Fidel’s for WI.

	MS Dhoni is a man who is comfortable in his own skin © Getty Images

What’s not to like about MS Dhoni? Even as an outsider, a neutral, someone who just watches cricket for the sheer pleasure of the sport without any patriotic leanings, I find myself drawn towards a character like Dhoni. He is hard to dislike.

Reading his post-match interviews after India’s surprising exit from the World T20 Championship, it is clear that Dhoni is a man who is comfortable in his own skin. He offers reasons, not excuses. He accepts blames, shares it sometimes but never looks to shift it. He concedes mistakes, both by himself and from his team without appearing to be too self-effacing or disloyal. He has a quiet dignity that is able to accept defeat with relative grace whilst still showing the right measure of pain and disappointment. The captain of India needs to walk this line carefully. Too many self-recriminations and the knives will be out. Too blasé and they’ll accuse you of not caring enough. Dhoni looks to have found the right balance.

	There may have been more to Younis Khan's candid admission that Twenty20 was 'fun' © Associated Press

At some point in the build up to this World Twenty20, Younis Khan would have assembled the rest of the Pakistan team think-tank to pore over the tournament's list of fixtures. Shoaib Malik would have been there along with Misbah-ul-Haq, Shahid Afridi and Kamran Akmal.The coach would probably have not been around, this being the kind of meeting where you only invite those you can call upon when it hits the fan out in the middle.

There would have been an intense seriousness to this meeting, a sober atmosphere that Pakistan's cricketers, with their trademark devil-may-care attitude, are loath to display in public. There would have been an implicit recognition of what was at stake. After the visiting Sri Lankans were attacked by terrorists in Lahore in March, John Stern, Editor of the Wisden Cricketer, questioned in an interview on CNN whether Pakistan would even be able to play in the World Twenty20. Stern's was only one prominent voice among many fussing about Pakistan's threat of cricketing isolation. The nucleus of Pakistan's team saw clearly, as indeed did the rest of the country, that the World Twenty20 would be their last chance to push back.

	Batsmen, and not the batting order, should be flexible in the approach to a match situation © Getty Images

It is not my intention here to offer a full-fledged post-mortem of India's early exit from the ICC World Twenty20. All I would like to do is to point out a mistaken emphasis in India's planning for its batting line-up. Which is that the Indian captain seems to think that flexibility in approaching match situations is achieved by changing the batting order. I'd like to suggest that the flexibility should inhere in the batsmen themselves, and not in the order in which they are sent in.

	Ashley Noffke is the latest in the list of fast bowlers moving to Western Australia © Getty Images

“Go West young man”. It appears to be the new anthem for any fast bowler in Australia looking for a new home. Western Australia, long considered to be the breeding ground for fast bowlers, is now the migrating home for disillusioned 'quicks' seeking opportunities on pitches long considered to be the fastest and bounciest pitches in the world.

Ashley Noffke is the latest quick bowler to join the Western Australia Warriors. Nurtured in Queensland, Noffke has had a very public falling-out with the locals and has decided to move to Perth to begin anew the quest to add to his solitary ODI cap. A fine bowling allrounder with a high action and a good outswinger, he joins a West Australian attack that is virtually entirely "Made in Queensland". Steve Magoffin and Ben Edmondson were both fringe players in the Queensland system when they left home, unable to crack the pedigree attack of Michael Kasprowicz, Andy Bichel, Joey Dawes, Mitchell Johnson and Noffke himself. For Queensland, an embarrassment of riches has now become a fast bowling kindergarten again, having lost the first three of those players to retirement and the latter two names to the West.