England played good cricket against the West Indies and it would be easy to undermine that by pointing to the quality of the opposition. It helps to play a side that crumbles when the going gets tough but you still have to create that situation and England did that consistently. Over the last couple of years there is a nice variety to their bowling where once there was only monotony. And now they have a spinner of serious quality in Monty Panesar. In fact in the last Test against the West Indies, they had a right hand swing bowler in Hoggard, a left arm swing bowler in Sidebottom, a fast bouncy quick in Harmison. And they had Monty.

You can’t ignore him anymore and I sometimes wonder if a few early snubs have made him stronger. There’s a child in him, a still accepting child, that looks upon the game as a wondrous spectacle. The best performers are those that feel indebted to the game. Most slowly migrate towards a certain forgetfulness of the bounty that life has delivered to them. Panesar hasn’t got there yet and hopefully, he won’t for there is so much beauty in this game that still lies undiscovered to him. In course of time he will bowl slower, every time pitches and batsmen pull out a weapon to thwart him he will pull a subtle one of his own out of his larder.

He is one of the game’s great sights now. A wonderful bowling action, strong fingers that spin the ball hard and as a result, a great ability to get drift towards leg stump. Only the best finger spinners can do that; drift it one way and then get it to turn the other. That way, Panesar is able to bowl a leg stump or a middle stump line to a right hander forcing him either to play against his considerable turn or move towards leg stump to play him inside out. The moment his line moves towards off stump, he will become half the bowler for batsmen can then drive him through cover or rock back and play the cut shot.

... contd.