By all accounts Sir Allen Stanford has made a howler or two recently, but has he ever been wider of the mark than in calling Test cricket 'tedious'? At times the Wisden Trophy 2008/9 has been atrociously umpired, embarrassingly played and incompetently managed, but - with the FBI's words 'fraud of shocking magnitude' providing an outrageous sub-plot - no-one is saying it has been dull.
After the third Test at St John's we might yet get some cricket out of the whole thing. As they did against India three years ago, the West Indies fought to the very final ball to salvage a draw in one of the outstanding recent Tests and hopefully the series is now on track. The anger with the referrals system, the England batting collapse and the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium debacle has subsided; cricket will move on easily enough from the Stanford embarrassment even if the legacy for Antigua is far more serious.
England will be feeling the pressure at 1-0 down with two to play, but the remaining Tests are at Bridgetown and Port of Spain. Neither of these grounds has produced a draw since April 2001, a run of 12 matches encouraging the tourists to believe that all three series results are still possible.
More difficult to spin is the reality of team selection. England admitted that the third Test draw felt like a defeat and now the engine room has gone kaput, Andrew Flintoff ruled out with a hip problem and Matt Prior playing peek-a-book in a Hove-area BUPA. Andrew Strauss must therefore choose between six batsmen or five bowlers for a Test he's desperate to win on a green, bouncy track prepared to help fast bowlers.
Given the pitch reports and England's conservative selection there can only be one serious option. Ian Bell and Ravi Bopara are head-to-head for Flintoff's spot with the decision likely hanging on a selector's hunch. Both scored runs against the BCA President's XI, Bopara a century and Bell 72, but the opposition was marginal. The question is whether they want to shake things up with the volatile Bopara or stick with the devil they know in Bell. The opportunities afforded to the Warwickshire batsman in that tour match suggest he has the advantage.
Tim Ambrose is restored to wicketkeeping duty. The Warwickshire man first took over from Prior in 2008 after 10 Tests and played 10 himself before losing the gloves in India. Prior had re-established himself since Chennai, batting well and cutting out the costly drops so Ambrose will have to do something special to keep his place. We might even argue that this is a missed opportunity to blood a serious rival to the incumbent.
If Strauss hits the Carib Beer hard he might be tempted to restore Ambrose to six, where he was so dreadfully exposed against South Africa last year, and pick five bowlers including Stuart Broad, Graeme Swann and Adil Rashid, all of whom can bat. Already an uncharacteristic gamble, doubts over Swann's fitness - he is rated at 85% with a piece of floating bone in his elbow - and a seamer's track surely rule this out.
Instead the choices will be much more straightforward. Swann plays if fit, Broad plays if breathing and then perm two from James Anderson, Ryan Sidebottom, Steve Harmison and new arrival Amjad Khan. Harmison, like Rashid, is a dubious option as one of four bowlers though for very different reasons. He and Anderson are the men in possession and after the toothlessness in St John's it will be tempting to shake up the seam attack for a fast, grassy surface. If Sidebottom is carrying an injury, and there are times when it looks that way, then Khan is in contention for a debut after his tour match five-fer; if Swann is ruled out Strauss may prefer a fourth fast bowler to the down-on-his-luck Monty Panesar.
No such trials and tribulations for the West Indies, who retain the same 13 from the second and third Tests on Antigua. However there must be a temptation to replace two of the great underachievers in this generation.
Devon Smith has made six, 38 and 21 in the series so far and though he showed better patience at St John's - a constant gripe against the left-hander - he is under severe pressure from Lendl Simmons, compiler of 282 for West Indies A in a tour match that now seems some months ago.
Daren Powell was under even greater scrutiny after a poor display last week: wayward in the first innings, he only picked up two wickets in the second as England suffered collective insanity, but he played two doughty knocks, one as nightwatchman, that effectively saved the game. If the selectors are unmoved by his courage then the young Montserrat bowler Lionel Baker will add to a forgettable first cap at Dunedin late last year.
When back-to-back Test matches first became a regular feature a few years ago, much store was put by the momentum gathered by winning the first but now they are so regular that this is hardly mentioned. The Sir Vivian Richards Stadium abandonment did the home side few favours after the first Test annihilation of England but Chris Gayle will look at a weakened visiting team and fancy his chances if Jerome Taylor and Fidel Edwards can replicate their best spells from St John's and Suleiman Benn accepts that Test cricket is not always as easy as Sabina Park suggested.
After all of the off-field chaos, the ICC seems almost determined to undermine the event. Russell Tiffin of Zimbabwe becomes the latest non-elite official to stand in the series alongside Aleem Dar. Daryl Harper is restored to the television referral box where the hapless match referee Alan Hurst is retained to defend his every obtuse verdict.
Key Players
West Indies: Shiv Chanderpaul has a fine record in Bridgetown and the last man Strauss will want to hang around as he seeks 20 wickets from a ragged attack.
England: Stuart Broad has improved considerably in recent months without looking capable of a Test-winning performance on his own. On a bouncy track, that will need to change though his fellow seamers have room for improvement too.
Prediction
West Indies seem to have done the hard part in St John's. England have struggled for 20 wickets with five bowlers so are really up against it now.
Last Five Head-to-Head:
2009: 3rd Test: Match drawn at the Antigua Recreation Ground, St John's.
2009: 2nd Test: Match abandoned at Sir Vivan Richards Stadium, North Sound.
2009: 1st Test: West Indies won by an innings and 23 runs at Sabina Park, Kingston.
2007: 4th Test: England won by seven wickets at Chester-le-Street, Co. Durham.
2007: 3rd Test: England won by 60 runs at Old Trafford, Manchester.
Likely Teams:
West Indies: Chris Gayle, Lendl Simmons, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Ryan Hinds, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Brendan Nash, Denesh Ramdin, Jerome Taylor, Sulieman Benn, Daren Powell, Fidel Edwards.
England: Alastair Cook, Andrew Strauss, Owais Shah, Kevin Pietersen, Paul Collingwood, Ian Bell, Tim Ambrose, Stuart Broad, Graeme Swann, Steve Harmison, James Anderson.
Dates: 26th-2nd March, 10.00-12.00 (14.00-16.00GMT), 12.40-14.40 (16.40-18.40GMT), 15.00-17.00 (19.00-21.00GMT).
Match Referee: Alan Hurst.
Umpires: Aleem Dar, Russell Tiffin and Daryl Harper (third).
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