To stay or go?

To bastardise the words of the Joe Strummer, should I stay or should I go

While it would be very harsh to criticise any England player that takes the decision that they don’t want to return to India to complete the tour with the two test matches in December, but I would still be pretty disappointed were any to go ahead and drop out.

If as seems likely the security advisors say it’s safe to go back and play (or as safe as anywhere can be in ‘these times of heightened security’), then that’s what we should do. The nature of your modern 21st century terrorist seems to indicate that there’s as likely to strike in one place as almost any other – excepting perhaps St Albans where nothing exciting has happened since roughly 1878.

A large number of the current England squad have young families, which will quite rightly be their first concern in deciding whether they want to travel. But I’m not genuinely concerned that there will be a raised threat on the team’s safety. That the recent attack took place in the hotel they stayed in recently, and were due back to later in the schedule will have brought things home to the players, and only naturally, but if there terrorists had wanted to target the England cricket team – they surely would have done already... they’ll have had ample opportunity and wouldn’t have sent out a vast clanging advance warning bell. Forewarned is forearmed.

KP has said that he won’t force any player reluctant to travel to go. But purely on a selfish level, career –wise surely it’s a risk. Of KPs current foot soldiers, very few are so nailed on in the team as to voluntarily forgo their place in the side confident in the knowledge that they’ll be able to slot comfortably back in when we’re on more familiar ground next spring. With men waiting in the wings like Owais Shah, Ravi Bopara, Samit Patel and Michael Vaughan, who’s to say someone like Paul Collingwood or Ian Bell would get back in the team if one of the others grabs a chance with both hands. And with the Australian juggernaut on the horizon that’s a huge risk.

Probably only Andrew Flintoff, and perhaps Alastair Cook would be able to return immediately to the set up. Even Monty Panesar – who as our number one spinner is earmarked for a huge role in the test series – surely wouldn’t want to see someone like Adil Rashid trotting in to bowl – a couple of big wickets against the calibre of batsman like Tendulkar or Dravid could catapult him straight into contention for the Ashes next year. Monty should know that’s pretty much how he got established himself on the previous tour of Indian (albeit in more conventional circumstances).

At the end of the day we employ experts for a reason, if we’re not prepared to follow their expert advice then there’s no point in asking them in the first place.