Npower’s online ad agency doesn’t know what Cricinfo is?

Gotta worry about their interactive srategy.

As regards the match… NZ showed the application England needed to show yesterday. If one England player had scored 80, we would have seriously scared India.

Interestingly, Michael Vaughan, in his book Calling the Shots, goes on at some length about his admiration for Stephen Fleming, and says he modelled his captaincy on Fleming’s style. I’ll just quote a bit of it here:

“Fleming is very thoughtful and I am particularly impressed by how he goes about his job in such a calm manner. When I got the England job, I said I would do it my way, but my way was more a Fleming way than a Hussain way.
“Fleming kept his cool in all situations. He never seemed to get flustered, wave his arms around, kick dirt, hurl his cap on the floor or show any noticeable emotion if players made mistakes. He just controlled everything in a measured fashion although he obviously had harsh words to say in the sanctuary of the dressing room. His team on the field always appeared to have a huge amount of respect for him.
“When I went back to Yorkshire after one England game as captain, he sat me down [Fleming had a brief stint playing for Yorkshire at the time] and asked me how I was finding it. It was all new to me and I just said I was trying to learn as I went along, but that I couldn’t believe the amount of criticism I was taking especially when people said I was too laid back, calm and casual for the job.
“Fleming just said: `Don’t listen to that, it’s a lot of hot air.’ He said he got it in the neck from Martin Crowe during his first 18 months in the job, with Crowe constantly in the media saying Stephen wasn’t tough enough and didn’t show enough emotion on the pitch. Fleming said to me that emotion doesn’t win you games of cricket. He told me he liked the way I was dealing with things on the pitch, that my mannerisms were pretty similar to his and that he guessed that we were pretty similar people — laid back and playing the game as we saw it; trying to be as professional and thoughtful as we could but realising it’s not the be-all and end-all.”

Doubly interesting stuff to me, as a supporter of both England and New Zealand, and as a commentary on captaincy. Fleming has been unchallenged captain of NZ for so long that he is part of the furniture. And like Vaughan, he unfortunately seems to be better appreciated by those outside his country than within. Of course cricket takes a distant second place to rugby in this country, as it does to football in England. A huge deal here too, though, when the Aussies are beaten.

Vaughan’s and Fleming’s comments on captaincy also made me think, again, that Flintoff is not the man to captain England. He is the team’s champion, but not its leader — there’s a big difference.