Ashes nerves

We're really quite edgy. It's a bit disappointing. All we've been doing recently is reading and what are we going to be doing when the match starts later on?

Will we be standing padded-up in front of 40,000 people trying to preserve our wicket and physical well-being? No. Will we be roaring in with the ball with a nation's hopes on our shoulders? No. We'll be sitting in a chair trying not to fall asleep. That's hardly a stretch. We do that all the time. We're doing it now.

The next step on our road to becoming an England cricketer is to become 'mentally tough'. This time next year we'll look rather less heartbroken when someone says something about our dress sense. We'll have fewer tantrums when we can't do fiddly stuff with small things. (We're not massively dextrous.)

Iron will and steely determination. We'll have perfected metallurgy of the mind.

Shane Warne sucks up the pressure and spits it in England's faces

"When Warney’s bowling and the match is in the balance, we have heart palpitations and have to breathe into a paper bag like they do on the telly."

Almost 12 months ago, we wrote the King Cricket top ten. This is what we wrote about Shane Warne who appeared at two.

The theme of that post is that runs are hard to come by and nerves play a massive part when Warne bowls in tight situations. That's what happened today. Warne took 4-49. England were all out for 129.

England's batsmen batted like lunatics, but Shane Warne created that situation. There would have been a little bit of nervousness at first; then, as wickets fell, they would have increased; until before long the batsmen were gibbering wrecks. That factor plays as big a part as any in Shane Warne's success.

The ability to channel the pressure of a match situation solely onto the batsman is Shane Warne's unique skill.