We may be out in the West Indies and preparing for a big Test series, but there’s only one place to start this blog, and that’s with the sad news about Richie Benaud.
He will always be remembered wherever cricket is played, by people of all ages.
The 2005 Ashes series was a defining moment for me as a cricket fan. I was only 14 then but his involvement in the coverage of that great series is still vivid in my mind.
The way he spoke about the game you could tell he had great knowledge about it, after being such a great cricketer himself, but also great affection for it.
To go to play in Sydney and see 50 Richies all standing together in their shades of beige, it’s a strange sort of compliment to the man, but again that shows the impact he made, wherever cricket is played, but also on people beyond cricket.
So Friday was a sad day for everyone involved in the game, including us out here in the Caribbean.
It’s been a bit bizarre getting our heads around Test cricket again, seven months or so since we last played red-ball cricket and won that series against India.
It took me about 20 minutes or half-an-hour to leave one the other day, I was still in one-day mode. But that is exciting for all of us, especially when you look at what’s coming up this year.
Hopefully this tour will give us a good start along that road.
Nobody would pretend the warm-up games in St Kitts went as we were expecting, but I don’t think it’s right to dismiss them as a waste of time.
Sometimes in a tour match like that you can be out after three balls and that’s your chance gone. The way things went, everyone got what they needed out of it – and I’d like to give the St Kitts lads a bit of credit for that, too.
They interacted really well with us and a couple of them definitely had the potential to improve and play at a higher level. Hopefully they got a bit out of the games as well.
I’ve never been to St Kitts before on my previous trips out here with England and Yorkshire, and learned a bit of a lesson when a few of us decided to run back from the ground. It’s hilly. But the scenery is fantastic.
Friday was our travel day to Antigua ahead of the serious business, and that first Test starting on Monday.
It will be Jimmy Anderson’s100th Test – a great achievement, obviously, but also a great inspiration to us in terms of the enthusiasm he’s still got to keep going.
We’ll be as excited as he is if he can break that wicket-taking record of Sir Ian Botham’s.
The only bad thing for Jimmy out here is he’s surrounded by Yorkshiremen. We’re suffocating him.
It’s been a bit weird for me, having guys like Adam Lyth andAdil Rashid who I still regard as senior players from when I came into the Yorkshire dressing room, but now it’s the other way around.
It’s great to have them here though and they both deserve it for their performances over the last couple of years. The great thing for me is how quickly they’ve fitted in as England players.
But we’re all still on our What’s App group with the Yorkshire lads at home, and we’ll be keeping a close eye on the start of the Championship season this weekend.
My younger brother Bill played against Yorkshire for the Leeds-Bradford University side last week, which gave me some mixed feelings.
But the word from home was that the guys have got what they needed and are prepped up for the first game against Worcestershire. Watch out Moeen!
The last thing I should mention is the sweepstake we’ve had on the Masters Golf. We drew names out of a hat and then auctioned the rest off, with varying fortunes.
Mark Saxby, our masseuse, is sitting pretty at the moment with Jordan Spieth. Belly’s looking all right with Jason Day. I got Zach Johnson, and bought Lee Westwood, and I really hope Lee can have a good couple of days – although I don’t want to jinx him before this appears.
You’d have to feel a bit sorry for Mark Wood though, another of the new guys out here. He pulled out two amateurs who were both about eight over after the first round. A tough start to his first England tour.