Hello all.

Been having laptop issues, and writing posts on the tablet is a real pain. Plus, it’s a weekend and I have other things to do!

England’s victory, which came as a great surprise to some, but as evidenced by my tweet midway through the South African’s innings, was fantastic. The theory I have is that by scoring 230 to win it does rather unclutter the mind. It’s put the pedal to the metal and have a real old go. So in the same way South Africa chased down that 430 odd those years ago, by going for it from ball one, so did we. And that’s the flip side of this new attitude. Plenty of column inches were devoted to the lack of sense this team showed towards the end of the South African series, and yes, that might be fair when setting a total. But when chasing, you have a less cluttered mind. It’s focus 100% on giving it a lash from the start. Jason Roy did that, Joe Root played the superstar innings we like to see from him, and the others (with perhaps the curious exception of our captain) maintained the pace. It was a top win. I’m not going to pretend any otherwise because to do so would be having an agenda, and that’s not me. I’m so fed up with explaining the wilful misrepresentation of my position, but I’ll say this – the performance on Friday does not neutralise the argument any more than Wednesday’s supported it. I will always say this country puts character above talent.

We have a bit of a break before the next game, so add your comments on the current matches on here. I saw AB’s 29 off an over this morning, and felt for Rashid who was getting all the plaudits on Twitter! I’ve just seen Cloete’s LBW decision on Dilshan and laughed. I defend umpires, but good grief.

Have a good week. I have a guest post from Sean B on the stocks which will be up later, as he discusses the T20 and other world cricket perspectives. It’s a good one.

As I said, the laptop is giving me some grief, so do bear with me.