Smash and dash for cash

The England squad for Stanford tournament has been announced and there are no real surprises. The 15 lucky boys are: Kevin Pietersen (capt), James Anderson, Ian Bell, Ravi Bopara, Stuart Broad, Paul Collingwood, Alastair Cook, Andrew Flintoff, Stephen Harmison, Samit Patel, Matt Prior (wk), Owais Shah, Graeme Swann, Ryan Sidebottom, Luke Wright.

The selectors appear to have decided to stick with the core of players that beat the South Africans pretty convincingly. While a logical thing to do it would have been nice to see a few fresh faces - Graham Napier being one of the most obvious choices and Rob Key and Joe Denly the others who may have been considered. Key and Denly have been a brilliant opening partnership for Kent and played a huge role in getting them to the Twenty20 cup final and almost winning it.

The problem with selecting "outsiders" is that the players who are currently in the team might throw a bit of a strop if denied the chance to win their $1 million. The rumours are already flying around that a promise of a place inthe squad was the reason for Harmison's sudden return to one-day cricket.

That's my main problem with this whole idea - money first, cricket second, which frankly is rubbish.

Hints for Stanford series?

England fans got an early look at the possible tactics of our Twenty-20 batsmen in the Stanford trophy later this year, as the one-day game against South Africa was shortened due to rain and became a 20 over run chase.

While the openers appeared to get a little carried away with the idea of scoring boundaries and managed to get themselves out, Owais Shah, Kevin Pietersen and Andrew Flintoff showed that the middle order have the ability to improvise, take advantage of poor deliveries and manage a run chase. Flintoff in particular looks in fantastic form and played with maturity. Since coming back from injury he has played himself in and then looked to start swinging instead of swinging every ball and hoping it worked. His confidence with the ball appears to be helping him with the bat.

Bring on the West Indians and Middlesex!