"I don't regret it, but I wish they hadn't put the pictures in the paper. I got a bit caught up in the moment."
End-of-year honesty from Andrew Flintoff about those post-Ashes celebrations

"There were two sections up at the southern end that were also like putty. It was unacceptable wicket preparation and a bit disappointing for the players. It was embarrassing."
Blunt talking from an unnamed official of Cricket Australia with regards to the poor MCG pitch on Boxing Day

"It is Warne who regularly does the moves with field positions and he constantly tries to prescribe to Ponting what to do. He is a real old showman who wants the attention to be focused on him all the time."
Graeme Smith hits back at Shane Warne and suggests Warne covets captaincy

"Normally the Poms rely on pitches that have not had a drink for longer than Bob Hawke or else have been affected by the sort of disease normally found only among Ukrainian politicians."
Peter Roebuck reflects on the pitches prepared for the Ashes and how Australia were done in on firm surfaces

"Bill Lawry is just a one-eyed old fart: not worth feeding or getting worked up about ... life is too short to endure Mr [Tony] Greig at any hour, much less before breakfast."
Telford Vice lets rip against couple of commentators

"I am heartbroken ... this is like an attempt to end my career."
Shabbir Ahmed reacts to being handed a one-year ban by the ICC following his action being reported for a second time

"Every demagogue in town has vented his spleen. Every Tom, Dick and Soumitra has voiced an opinion."
Peter Roebuck on the hysterical reaction accompanying Sourav Ganguly's exclusion

"People have a pop at the ICC. We don't mind that as long as its constructive."
ICC president Ehsan Mani reacts to recent criticism over Zimbabwe, sledging, supersubs, Powerplays ...

"Jennings was to orthodoxy what King Herod was to child-minding."
Mike Atherton reviews 2005 and mentions Ray Jennings' less than standard method of coaching

"He said I looked like Tarzan, and wondered how I could bowl fast looking like that."
Shoaib Akhtar reveals how Andrew Flintoff inadvertently boosted his will to win

"Quite a few Pakistani players used to drink maybe three or four years ago but now the team is more religious and alcohol is never allowed."
Azhar Mahmood on Pakistan's new approach

"We left Downing Street and there was a lot of photographers. He said: 'What do they want?' So I looked at him and said: 'A photo, you knob!'"
Matthew Hoggard jokes on They Think It's All Over about what he said during a spot of post-Ashes hobnobbing with Tony Blair at Downing Street

"If you're playing a big match you shouldn't be breaking your sleep. Do they not regard Pakistan as a threat? I'm sure the players will all put their hands up and say it didn't affect them, but how the hell do they know? The two guys who went to bed and had eight hours sleep batted very well."
Geoff Boycott on the wisdom of Andrew Flintoff getting up at 3am to accept the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award. Hours later Flintoff made 0 against Pakistan

"I am amazed that the ICC sees fit to warn players, and even past players, in the media. If there are genuine concerns that players may offend the spirit of the game then this should be taken up with them directly and not in the form of a public lecture."
CEO of the South African Cricketers' Association Tony Irish joins in the backlash against the ICC

"They do nothing about blokes chucking, they do nothing about all this other stuff; they are more worried about words, that is all they are, full of words, the ICC. They always look like they are doing something but they do nothing. They are the biggest bullshitters in the world. What a waste of space."
Former Aussie paceman Jeff Thomson sets out his bid for a place on the ICC executive board

"We don't want cricket being reduced to a level where it turns into a hooligans' sport and the spirit of the game is eroded. We can't have a situation like we see in football."
ICC president Ehsan Mani shows he is not a great supporter of the beautiful game

"They might need one by the time we've finished with them."
Shane Warne approves of South Africa's plans to fly a psychologist from Johannesburg to motivate the players before the first Test at Perth

"I hope it will be quick - that will turn me on. I enjoy pace."
AB de Villiers hopes for a pacy pitch for the first Test at Perth

"I am against the ICC. The reason is it's run by all the goras (whites)."
Wasim Akram with comments that would get others in deep trouble. It also ignores the way the ICC is made up. Aside from that, nothing controversial

"Life without sport is like life without underpants."
Life according to Billy "Y-front" Bowden

"Apples being thrown at your head is something we don't want to happen in cricket."
Brett Lee states the bleeding obvious

"You see the way Gilly throws the ball in the air. He tends to play on his walking, his honesty, but he still tries to burgle anyone and everyone."
Former New Zealand sprinter Mark Richardson on Adam Gilchrist

"I always viewed him as a once-in-20 games bowler."
Arjuna Ranatunga offers his frank views on Ajit Agarkar

"It isn't quite monotonous."
Waqar Younis retains a degree of diplomacy when asked about the chanting of the Barmy Army at Lahore

"You're not a morning person, are you Bob."
BSkyB anchor Charles Colvile poses a question we all wanted to ask to Bob Willis after the former England captain, who has been on air at 4am throughout the Pakistan-England series, grumpily slammed everyone and everything

"Daryl Harper - hopeless ... Billy Bowden - a showpony ... Steve Bucknor - past his sell-by date."
Former England captain turned pundit Bob Willis slams the ICC's elite umpires

"We're the new Surrey."
Paul Collingwood is delighted that Durham have three players in the England team

"I won't be clambering down any chimneys as Santa or ice-skating in Norway this Christmas."
Ashley Giles explains the limitations of his hip surgery - but does this mean that he does climb down chimneys every other Christmas?

"We are told, nonetheless, that it is a done deal, that to unravel it would cost millions. This is spin of a type that Ashley Giles could only dream of."
David Brook, who is leading the campaign to ditch the ECB deal with subscription channel BSkyB and restore English cricket to free-to-air stations

"Shoaib, leave the chicken man alone, and start your practice."
Pakistan coach Bob Woolmer to Shoaib Akhtar as he chatted to Kevin Pietersen

"Shahid Afridi did nothing worse last week than 99% of professional cricketers have been guilty of doing at some stage of their careers. His mistake was to get caught. Every cricket team I played in discussed, at some stage, how to scuff up a pitch on a spinner's length."
Mike Atherton puts pitch-scuffing in context

"It's not only England, but they are doing it when the batsman is in his crease attempting nothing. It's just fairly juvenile."
Bob Woolmer on bowlers shying at the striker's stumps

"There is no one to play the village idiot as Darren Gough used to do ... but I've got a Playstation and loads of DVDs. Between us, we've got about 300 different films and documentaries, so there's no need to watch any repeats."
Marcus Trescothick on the delights of touring

"If there is one England player who can claim to be Botham's heir, it is Kevin Pietersen, the team peacock, as much of a fashion victim now as Botham was 20 years ago. Botham never attempted the dead skunk look, but his hair and sense of dress have made some other drastic turns."
Patrick Kidd on the fashion sense of Ian Botham

"People have said it must be disappointing to be involved in some one-sided Test wins after the excitement of the series in England, but I'm not sure I'll ever be disappointed about not being involved in a competitive series after the Ashes experience."
Ricky Ponting admits to liking that winning feeling

"No foreplay, little titillation. Just wham, bam, thank you ma'am and not even time for a post-coital cigarette."
Charles Happell on the crammed 2006-07 Ashes schedule

"A player hesitates over a decision on TV and gets fined, or has a bat logo too large and gets the same treatment. A whole nation's cricket fraternity is about to collapse, and because of some weird rule in the constitution, it cannot get involved."
Henry Olonga on the (in)action of the ICC over Zimbabwe's internal battle

"I like Sourav's arrogance. I don't like him begging for a place. He should stand tall and perform consistently to get back into the team. That is the Sourav Ganguly I know."
Kapil Dev advises Ganguly

"The left index finger was raised slowly, but more hesitantly than usual, in answer to the familiar war dance the Australians describe as an appeal."
Tony Cozier on the controversial dismissal of Brian Lara in the second innings of the second Test at Hobart

"I would pay good money to watch him bat when I retire from coaching."
Bob Woolmer joins the Shahid Afridi fan club after his batting assault at Faisalabad

"Martin Luther King had a dream. I have a nightmare. It involves watching the end of the next Ashes sitting in London Cricket Unit No. 2, surrounded by City boys on the jolly, sipping a lukewarm £6 pot of ICC beer-style beverage ... it's another example of the ICC's attempt to 'own' every aspect of world cricket."
The ICC's new regulations on bringing alcohol into grounds come under attack in The Wisden Cricketer

"It is difficult to see how they can make rational decisions on cricket when they see so little of the game outside of the lavishly catered internationals."
Former South African board chairman Ray White on the lack of regional administrators watching the top-of-the-table clash between Highveld Lions and the Cape Cobras

"I told my boys that I have kept my record of losing finals intact."
Sourav Ganguly lets out a wry smile after East Zone lose in the Duleep Trophy final

"I'd like to make a point about s**t rules."
Apparently, Darren Lehmann isn't a fan of the new supersub rules in one-day cricket

"I didn't see him in Australia because he didn't turn up for the first three days of the Test." Steve Harmison on Shoaib Akhtar's laissez-faire attitude to the Super Test

"Glenn McGrath said, 'If you ever get asked about that shot, say you didn't get it,' but I swung as hard as I could and it sailed over the roof."
Brett Lee takes his place in history as the first player to clear the stands of the remodelled Gabba

"He's an annoying bastard. In fact, a couple of guys in that South African team have been a pain in the arse."
Lou Vincent grudgingly acknowledges Justin Kemp's influence in the South Africa's series triumph

"In a fit of boredom we have all decided to grow moustaches."
Shaun Udal reveals how the England squad will be tackling those long evenings on tour. He admitted that his effort "looks a bit like Hitler's"

"We won't have every state side to pick from and fly someone in to field for us. We'll just pick up one of the local club cricketers in Brisbane to do the fielding."
Ricky Ponting makes it clear that Australia won't require any fielder to replace Stuart MacGill during the Gabba Test

"Everyone was watching Dhoni. No one came to us. Dhoni made a lot of money and left cracker-sellers high and dry."
A shopkeeper in Bhubaneshwar reveals the real reason for low sale of firecrackers

"The guys look in top nick in the nets. I know it's different in the middle but the conditions in the middle are also lot different to the nets. I won't read too much into it."
Shame it's not about form in the nets. James Anderson looks on the bright side after England closed on 39 for 6

"Some players are 180% fitter than they were from when we started."
Pakistan coach Bob Woolmer plays the numbers game

"He can be so rude to people that sometimes you just want to punch his lights out."
That's fighting talk: Mark Nicholas on his co-commentator Geoff Boycott

"You won't get me knocking him as a cricketer, but as a man I detest him."
David Lloyd takes his views of Geoff Boycott that little bit further than Nicholas

"There are cameras following you outside your house. I mean, how many times can they follow you to Booth's supermarket?"
Andrew Flintoff on the price of fame. And sadly, Andrew, the answer is: they can keep it up for years

"Inzamam-ul-Haq's languid batting can make Marcus Trescothick's footwork seem like a qualification for a starring role in Riverdance."
Mike Selvey on one of his favourite all-time cricketers, Inzamam-ul-Haq

"It was a mixture of bad bowling, good shots and arse."
Jason Gillespie eloquently sums up his Ashes series

"A scoring system that is harder to fathom than Sudoku."
Blunt talking and candid honesty from the ICC website in a reference to the incomprehensible points system in place for the Intercontinental Cup

"In four things does Multan abound: dust, beggars, heat and burial grounds."
Mike Atherton turns to an ancient Persian verse to sum up the challenge awaiting England this winter

"You know what's more? All the palaver caused me to burn my toast."
Duncan Fletcher reveals the droll side of his character, as he highlights the most important aspect of the Ricky Ponting run-out rumpus at Trent Bridge

"I thought it would come across as a joke and it's come across the wrong way."
Nathan Bracken learns that ball-tampering is no laughing matter. He was quoted as claiming that English bowlers polished the ball with breath-freshening mints to achieve reverse swing

"I have to watch my skin more and make sure that I look good and have had my hair done. I could easily lose my crown back to David Beckham if I'm not careful."
Freddie Flintoff on the pressures of being a gay icon

"I don't know, you will have to ask my investor."
Michael Vaughan has more houses than hot dinners, to judge by his response to a question about the number of properties he now owns

"I finished the Ashes physically and emotionally drained. Looking back, I ought not to have retreated into myself the way I did."
With a new contract in the bag, John Buchanan accepts that mistakes were made in the planning of Australia's Ashes campaign

"I think the concept's great. The idea of this series is fantastic, and hopefully I'll get to play in a few more of them through the years ... [But] it's no compensation for losing the Ashes."
After a fortnight of being determinedly on message, Ricky Ponting admits what we all knew

"His googly remains as hard to read as James Joyce and his deliveries turned and bounced sharply from a dusty surface."
Peter Roebuck describes Stuart MacGill's craft

"I was invited to Bush's ranch and when I said I had a home in Antigua, he asked me to explain cricket to him because it looks a bit like polo and baseball combined ... only without the horses. We discussed it for half an hour."
Allen Stanford, who is investing £16 million in West Indies cricket, explains the rudimentaries to the American president

"This is not a joke, so just shut up."
John Wright cracks the whip as Shoaib Akhtar interrupts him during a Super Series team meeting

"I don't see myself as being bigger than anybody simply because I'm the captain."
Inzamam-ul-Haq shows his sense of irony

"I was the fattest 20-year-old in England."
Andrew Flintoff has some plump memories of his early Test career

"There's no question that anyone went out there to fail ... no one does."
World XI coach John Wright tries to handle critcism of his talented yet underperforming charges

"I feel I'm on The Truman Show."
Shane Warne feels the media has made his life a soap opera

"I guess it goes to show that you don't just play for the money."
Andrew Flintoff explains just why the Super Series is anything but

"I don't believe in leaping. No matter how high you jump, you have to come down"
Michael Holding comments on air on the futility of bowlers jumping high before delivering the ball

"It's sad when you take things on the field off the field."
Ah, the irony! Graeme Smith responds to Michael Vaughan's revelation that Smith called Andrew Flintoff a "big baby", conveniently forgetting that he had done the same when he went to town about the Australians sledging him on his debut

"Don't stand under the sun waiting for me. I am not going to say anything."
Mum's the word, Sourav Ganguly refuses to comment on his exclusion

"This Super Test will be a bit like Christmas day for me."
An on-message Justin Langer gets excited. So his day will involve overeating, lots of presents and a morning in church

"I saw a picture of him and Caprice in the paper. But as long as he's happy that's cool."
Richard Logan seems less than enamoured with Hampshire team-mate Kevin Pietersen's model girlfriend

"He is the Freddie Flintoff of our industry."
The Times on Oscar-winning animator Nick Park. Park, like Flintoff, is a freeman of Preston

"I went back to South Africa, but I didn't go home."
Kevin Pietersen on asked by the host Mark Nicholas at the ICC awards night, on what it was like going home to South Africa with England

"This is a nice challenge, but when you look down at your shirt, that badge isn't there."
Try as he might, Steve Harmison just can't get worked up about the Super Test

"I'm completely different from Pietersen. He would turn up to the opening of an envelope."
Andrew Flintoff doesn't hold back in ribbing KP

"He might have women throwing themselves at him now, but that is only due to who he is - because he's not the best looking bloke, is he?"
Kevin's brother, Bryan, joins in

"I just came for the food."
Andrew Flintoff tells it as it is and leaves ICC spin doctors spluttering in their pasta after being named joint Player of the Year at a glitzy event in Sydney

"'In the 1987 final when Gatt reverse swept, the twat. We were cruising."
Phil DeFreitas finally gets it all off his chest about losing a World Cup final

"Badly led, poorly selected, abysmal in the field, lamentable between the wickets, rusty and in some cases distracted, the makeshift visiting side has been mauled."
Peter Roebuck struggles to buy into the ICC vision of the Super Series

"He said he would trade it all in to do what I do. He's very passionate about singing, so I said, 'Let's get together'. He's a big karaoke man and he loves crooning."
Opera singer Jon Christos reveals that Andrew Flintoff, who he will coach at singing, would give up cricket for his other passion

"I thought it was a bit rude when the umpire gestured me with a finger so I showed my middle one back."
Crystal Palace midfielder Aki Riihilati shows why footballers will never be the new cricketers after he plays his first match

"He is a bit of a superhero over here. People keep coming up to me saying, 'What's Andrew Flintoff like?"
Brett Lee on Australia's Flintoff craze

"Kevin Pietersen is larger than life but there are a few guys trying to compete with him on that scale. It's a good battle."
Daniel Vettori shows the World XI are not only jostling for positions on the field

"There's the smile that captivated a nation."
Mark Nicholas gushes about Brett Lee's dentistry

"He is invariably at a loss for words when he talks about cricket because he just doesn't know a thing about the game. No wonder, he pronounces it as `kirkit' or `krikate'; and fortunately he doesn't have to spell it."
Former Indian board chairman Raj Singh Dungarpur on his great mate Jagmohan Dalmiya

"Absurd, old-fashioned and patronising"
England women's captain, Clare Connor, responds to Robin Marlar's comments

"Girls! It's absolutely outrageous!"
The new face of MCC, president Robin Marlar makes his feelings known about mixed sex cricket

"Hopefully we've learned from our mistakes that we made during the Ashes. If we don't learn from them then we're pretty stupid."
Ricky Ponting gears up

"Chappell and Ganguly make Raymond Illingworth and myself seem like lovers in comparison."
Need Michael Atherton say more?

"District cricketers are always trying to whack him out of the ground so they can tell their mates they hit Warney for six"
Tim O'Sullivan, the captain of the St Kilda club side, explains why club players go after Shane Warne

"He turned up as if he was royalty - it was like having Prince Charles on your side... there were rumours he was asking people to carry his coffin for him, although he never asked me."
Andrew Flintoff shares his thoughts on the difficult relationship he and his Lancashire colleagues had with Sourav Ganguly in 2000

"Greg has only been in the job five months and at the moment it doesn't look like he and Ganguly would go on holiday together."
Former India coach John Wright gives his thoughts on the crisis in the Indian team

"The last time I danced was after a semi-final win against Australia. Freddie Flintoff and I did some rock'n'roll moves. I also won a prize for rock'n' roll dancing at a youth club when I was 16 ... but only three people entered."
Darren Gough reveals he will take part in the BBC's new series of Strictly Come Dancing instead of touring Pakistan with England

"It's the first time I've seen the red carpet out here."
Marcus Trescothick continues to adapt to his new life as one of the Ashes winners as he arrives at the PCA awards

"At the end I just wished there was another Test to play the following week..."
... although not a Super Series Test -Andrew Flintoff was sorry when the Ashes had to come to a close

"Once a chucker always a chucker."
Raj Singh Dungarpur, the former president of the Indian board, takes a shot at Harbhajan Singh

"I've never had to dress up before to move house but I just don't know when I'm going to get snapped."
Rachael Flintoff reveals how her life has taken a glamorous upturn since marrying Freddie.

"I might have done some dumb things in my time, but I think that is one of the dumbest things I have ever seen in my life. It was just absolutely ridiculous."
Shane Warne's take on Kent captain David Fulton's decision to accept a near-impossible run-chase that helped Nottinghamshire clinch the English county championship

"I am a great fan of Ashley Giles."
Bob Woolmer pays tribute to England's heroic spinner

"We are confident that our twin objectives of meeting event revenue targets and achieving maximum global audience reach will be met."
ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed talking about the Super Series. Never mind runs and wickets, it's dollars that seem to be the driving force

"Footballers are great actors anyway - all you have to do is touch them on the ankle and they roll over screaming for a penalty."
Kevin Pietersen puts the boot in, during the premiere of the new football-based film, Goal!

" I was a bit worried that it would be embarrassing and that there would be only three men and a dog out on the streets to see us."
Matthew Hoggard needn't have fretted. Tens of thousands lined the street of London for England's open-top bus procession

"The only drinks on offer were pineapple juice and water. At the prime minister's house! Anyway, someone obviously had a quiet word and soon enough some white wine appeared. It was a bit warm, but you can't have everything I suppose."
Hoggard again, this time on the reception at No. 10 Downing Street

"You can have your rugby tests, you can have international soccer, but this is what matters and there has been a frittering away of the spirit and he [Mr Beazley] holds that weasel [Mr Howard] responsible for it. He's [Howard] lost it for us, we will never forget, it's a crime"
A spokesman for Kim Beazley, Australia's leader of the opposition, makes it clear where his boss thinks the blame for the Ashes defeat lies

"That means I can drive a flock of sheep through the town centre, drink for free in no less than 64 pubs, and get a lift home with a policemen when I become inebriated. What more could you want?"
Andrew Flintoff seems just as excited by the freedom of the city of Preston as he does by the Ashes

"I've got the Super Series in two weeks' time. I can't think of anything worse."
In vino veritas, Andrew Flintoff admits he'd rather not be going Down Under quite so soon after this series. The Aussies would probably prefer he stayed at home as well.

"Pietersen might have gone for nought when he was dropped off Shane Warne, but it was really down to the slip catch missed by Warne himself - so simple even Pietersen (nought for six in the series) might have caught it."
Martin Johnson writes in The Daily Telegraph

"I doubt if I'll be feeling very well, though. If I am then something will have gone seriously wrong with the celebrations."
Ashley Giles on the morning after

"A strong England side is the best thing that could have happened for the Ashes and world cricket."
Bill Brown, Australia's oldest living Test cricketer, convinced that the series was the most exciting he has ever witnessed

"I don't owe Shane anything, I have dropped six catches and nobody bought me a beer."
Kevin Pietersen remarks nonchalantly on the lucky reprieve he had on 15, when Shane Warne dropped a sitter

"For me it was a nice touch for them to say 'we wish you were English'."
Shane Warne salutes the crowd at The Oval after his final Test on English soil

"Not over till the fat laddie spins."
The Sun pays a backhanded compliment to Shane Warne

"Win or lose the Ashes, I'm going to find the best bottle of red wine in town and present him with it."
There can be no higher praise for Andrew Flintoff from Ian Botham

"He's a lovely guy, that Ricky Ponting. He likes the English so much he changed the series for them with the most stupid decision he'll ever make in his life."
Geoff Boycott is still gloating about Ponting's decision to bowl first in the pivotal Test at Edgbaston

"Can you put some lights on the bails? I can't see who I'm bowling at!"
Andrew Flintoff makes a polite point to Rudi Koertzen, as England battle on in the gloom at The Oval

"Morning Geraint, how are you?"
A Sky News reporter demonstrates the depth of his new-found love of cricket, as he greets Paul Collingwood on the morning of the third day at The Oval

"At eight minutes past three came the worst moment of the Ashes summer so far. Matthew Hayden smiled."
Simon Barnes, chief sports writer of the Times, spots a seminal moment

"There should be workplace flexibility and that means where it's possible there should be flexible arrangements so people could watch the boys, and I say to [captain] Ricky [Ponting], good luck."
John Howard, the prime minister of Australia, telling the bosses to lighten up on their workers

"This is the first time the Oval Test match actually counts for something in my time, and this is my fourth tour."
Shane Warne on the biggest Test of his 127-match career

"It would be nice if I could win a toss. Or if I don't, it would be nice if England is not 1 for 130 at lunch like it was at Edgbaston and Trent Bridge."
Ricky Ponting presents his wishlist ahead of the decider at The Oval

"While every company is aware of the risks posed by computer viruses, few will have ever considered Ricky Ponting and Michael Vaughan's men a potential threat to their computer networks."
Stuart Beattie of Network General on the possibility of internet connections getting blocked as millions are expected to log on to keep up with the fifth Test

"We've probably over-analysed our game on this tour. Cricket is a one-ball game, but sometimes players think too much about what's gone before and what the consequences of their actions will be."
John Buchanan finally realises where they went wrong in this series

"It's much better than being a footballer - in that game half the nation hates you because you play for the wrong club. That must be hell."
Rachael Flintoff is delighted, like the rest of the nation, that Freddie chose cricket

"If he wants to do another fitness test two days out from the fifth Test, I'll kick his bum because it's distracting everyone"
Former Australian batsman Dean Jones has had enough of Glenn McGrath's fitness worries and wants him to clear all uncertainty well before the final Test at The Oval

"How can you tell your wife you are just popping out to play a match and then not come back for five days?"
Rafael Benitez, manager of Liverpool FC, struggles to understand the great game

"If I was on 99 and at the other end and you got out, I'd hit you with my bat."
Once said Geoff Boycott to Matthew Hoggard. Hoggard received batting tuition from Boycott a few years ago - in his living room.

"So where that cover-drive came from, I haven't got a clue."
Matthew Hoggard on his cover-driving heroics in the fourth Ashes Test at Trent Bridge

"It would be disastrous if England's top cricketers suddenly started behaving like David Beckham and his £100,000-a-week mates in football. They seem a dreadful lot. Oiks who know the value of everything and the meaning of nothing."
Former England seamer turned journalist Angus Fraser on suggestions that cricket is becoming the new football

"That Glenn McGrath ... what a bastard."
Cricket nut Mick Jagger profiles Australia's veteran seamer

"Whether we win or lose, we relish creating a bit of an arse-nipper."
Ashley Giles on the Test series that has been a little too close for comfort

"You want to take a run to a cover fielder and get run out, whose fault is that?"
Duncan Fletcher reacts to Ricky Ponting's unhappiness with England's use of substitute fielders. Ponting was run out by one of them

"Zimbabwe are better than you"
A damning chant from the crowd at Bulawayo after India collapsed to 44 for 8 against New Zealand. They eventually lost by 51 runs

"Just 500 metres from the ground people are being beaten to death and crippled while a game is going on. The ICC is disgusting in the way it has handled cricket issues in Zimbabwe."
Zimbabwe opposition MP Roy Bennett, himself arrested and beaten by the Mugabe regime, hits out

"There's nothing like the sound of flesh on leather to get a cricket match going."
Former Australian fast bowler Geoff Lawson shows that even in retirement he thinks like a quick bowler

"I'm going to be like a kid in a sweet shop. I'll be taking my autograph book and I won't quite know where to put myself."
Andrew Flintoff shows humility at his inclusion to the ICC Super Series Test and one-day squads

"Guys were being made to stay in the same seat so they didn't cause the fall of another wicket. You could dash to the toilet between overs but you had to be back in place before the next ball."
Michael Slater reveals what went on - or, rather, what didn't - in the Australian dressing room during the last stages of the Old Trafford Test

"I really get annoyed with this reverse swing term. It's either an outswinger or an inswinger, isn't it?"
Former Australian captain Ian Chappell refuses to get to grips with reverse swing

"We were brought up watching opening batsmen score nine before lunch. If Geoffrey Boycott flashed at a ball outside off stump in the first over of a Test match, questions were asked in Parliament. If he flashed at two, the ravens abandoned the Tower of London."
Brian Viner writes about the frenetic pace of the current Ashes series and wonders what happened to Test cricket as he knew it

"Test match series involving our lads [Australia] became utterly joyless processions of boarish triumphalism. Ugly affairs conducted by increasingly arrogant, ugly people."
Jonathan Green feels Australia's über confidence, and lack of a challenge in the past decade, has been their undoing in this year's Ashes

"Find a way to get back in to the game, find a way to build a partnership, find a way to bowling partnerships, find a way to catch a ball, find a way to stop it. "
Shane Warne feels that "finding a way" should be the Aussies' slogan as they prepare for the Trent Bridge Test

"We should really apologise for the interlude in what is really important at the moment, the cricket"
BBC Radio Five Live's commentator, Mike Ingham, on the England football team's 4-1 capitulation at the hands of Denmark

"I'm not a big cricket man myself, but even I found myself watching it, watching how tense it was, down to the last ball."
David Beckham joins the cricket fever that is sweeping the nation. Shame his football team couldn't ride the wave, as they were thrashed 4-1 by Denmark.

"England are playing pretty well, but I'm just not sure they know how to win yet"
Former Australian medium-pacer Paul Reiffel zeroes in on the problem

"But the fact remains that when a sporting event is covered by Sky it does not capture the sense of a great national sporting occasion"
Kate Hoey voices her opinion on Sky, who take over the broadcasting of cricket in Britain in 2006

"Our blokes could go back and play the rest of the Test countries over the next two or three years and still average 55, and they'd do that standing on their head, because there is no other decent attack"
Kim Hughes blames the poor bowling attacks around the world for Australia's ineptness against the pace of England

"This Australian side has more cart horses than a Victorian mail coach ... suddenly this team is looking its age. Sometimes, when the end comes, it is quick. It's been a wonderful run. Harder days lie ahead."
Peter Roebuck on the end of an era

"Jason Gillespie is a 30-year-old in a 36-year-old body"
Former England captain Bob Willis fires away

"Most teams, you know, only the next player to bat puts pads on. With Zimbabwe, everyone puts pads on."
A Zimbabwe supporter half-jokingly comments on his national team

"It's not doing much for my street cred."
Andrew Strauss, with a bandaged ear and tintinnitus, reflects on the regularity with which Brett Lee has been clattering him on the helmet

"Everyone talks about Harmison and Flintoff and then you get these two rabbits who come on and take three wickets each."
John Buchanan winces at the fact that Ashley Giles and Simon Jones both picked up three wickets

"If McGrath plays, then I want to have an injection of what he's on."
Kevin Pietersen speaks out while Glenn McGrath was undergoing a public fitness test

"Hopeless, clueless, useless."
The Herald, Zimbabwe's national newspaper, sums up the cricket team's latest performance

"It's almost beyond my comprehension how someone could take 600 Test wickets. I know how hard I had to work to get 187."
Geoff Lawson, the former Australian fast bowler, can't stop wondering

"I did call him Freddie once, but he said: 'No, you can't call me Freddie. I'm Andrew to you'."
Rachel Flintoff on life in the Flintoff household

"I have got plans for all the guys I bowl to, especially Straussy. I call him the new Daryll. He's the new Cullinan, I reckon."
Shane Warne picks his new bunny

"He said he feels rather honoured to have jokes made about him. It's quite funny really. For us it's hard to hear - he's not the worst-ever English wicketkeeper, he's my brother."
Geraint Jones's sister Mari Vines wonders what all the fuss is about

"It would have been a very tough decision to make. If I was the fielding side and didn't get that one I would have been devastated."
Michael Kasprowicz sympathises with Billy Bowden's desperately difficult judgment to end the second Test

"We felt it would better suit smoother scheduling for our customers if we switched matches."
Carol Wong, a spokeswoman for telecom company PCCW in Hong Kong, explains the rationale behind the decision to cut short the final moments of the Edgbaston Test to switch to the epic between Zimbabwe and New Zealand at Harare

"I turned up expecting to have plenty of coffee and tea, and cake - and end up playing in a Test match."
Michael Kasprowicz reflects on the strange circumstances of his elevation to the Test side, following Glenn McGrath's ankle injury

"I've got a little bit of ginger hair. That's what I bring to sides."
Paul Collingwood justifies his call-up to England's Test squad

"My diet is still pizzas, chips, toasted cheese sandwiches and milkshakes. I have the occasional six-week burst where I stick to fruit and cereal: it bloody kills me."
Shane Warne on the not-so-secret ingredients to his success

"Can't bat, can't bowl, can't field. Famously, they said that about the last England side to win the Ashes. Now they are saying it about me."
Ashley Giles gives an object lesson in self-promotion

"When I first started they put the beers on ice. Now they put the players on ice."
Former Australia international Darren Lehmann remarks on how Australia's pre-match preparations have improved over the years

"It's not about a pink clubhouse, or meeting to discuss makeovers, or how we could rearrange the furniture."
Duncan Irvine, press secretary of Grace's, the first all-gay cricket team

"Get a single down the other end and watch someone else play him."
Geoff Boycott when asked how best to tackle Glenn McGrath

"Most of us knew it was just a mickey-take but there is that 'what if?' thought in the back of your mind"
Yorkshire captain Craig White's reaction after a man with an Osama bin Laden mask and a rucksack walked out to the middle of the pitch during a National League match against Warwickshire at Scarborough

"My prediction is 2-1 to England so I'm still on course for that"
David Graveney's optimism is still sky high despite England's first Test drubbing against Australia

"Do you want some Pringles and a cuppa?"
How can the ladies resist? Simon Jones's alleged seduction technique, as reported in The News of the World

"He's a bright lad, and is doubtless already instructing his agent to get up to Somerset House and start scouring the archives for a third cousin who eloped with a jolly swagman, or a great-grandmother who played the didgeridoo."
The Daily Telegraph's Martin Johnson on suggestions that Kevin Pietersen is good enough to get in the Australian XI

"[Kevin Pietersen's] only real weakness he has shown so far in his England career is an ability to come up with some ridiculously stupid comments, which has added great value to the dressing room."
Andrew Strauss speaks for the nation

"I am a player"
quips Geoff Boycott when asked, by a steward, to keep the gangway clear for the players at Lord's

"Freddie is a big unit and likes to get very animated when he is appealing, which puts extra duress on the crotch area of his trousers."
Andrew Flintoff's trouser manufacturer explains why the big man needs a reinforced crotch

"I just try to bore the batsmen out. It's pretty simple stuff but the complicated thing is to keep it simple"
Glenn McGrath reveals his formula, after marching into the exclusive 500 club

"I'm not much of a show-pony, but today I thought I deserved it!"
Glenn McGrath justifies a swift change of boots midway through his first-day spell at Lord's. The new versions were gold-trimmed with "500" emblazoned on the side

"Both sets of players are sick and tired of talking about the Ashes ..."
Michael Vaughan on the eve of the first Test

"Quidditch is a wildly exciting, cricket-type game that is an obsession with many in the wizarding world, including Harry and Ron."
A journalist with the Toledo Blade, an American newspaper, gets her sports mixed up while explaining Harry Potter to American readers

"We can get a man on the moon, yet we can't find a white cricket ball that lasts 80 overs."
Geoff Boycott shoots from the hip during the annual Cowdrey Lecture

"I wouldn't nick it."
Adam Gilchrist's response to whether he would walk if Australia were two short of victory in the final Test with one wicket at hand

"I played seven Ashes series against Australia and lost all seven but before every one of them I always went in with the attitude, `We can win this.' "
Alec Stewart's opinion on the right attitude to take on Australia

"Have you ever smelt the perfume of a rose? When you smell a rose it really gets you back living in the mould."
Australia's hardman Justin Langer reveals his softer side

"This England attack is a really nasty mob - and they mean business."
Rodney Hogg, another Australian hard man, on the current England side

"We find it both amusing and amazing how they always talk it up with about 12 months to go, telling everyone that they've finally got the team to beat us."
Glenn McGrath remarks on the unsurprisingly enormous hype before the Ashes

"My disappointment at not seeing Lara this time is bigger than an elephant."
Percy Abeysekera, the most well-known Sri Lankan fan, is not overjoyed with the West Indies team currently touring his country

"It shook me up, and I know it probably would have shook Trescothick up as well. I felt so embarrassed by what happened. I didn't mean it."
Brett Lee reflects on his beamer in the NatWest Series final

"No team should be compelled to go to a place where gross human rights abuses are occurring."
New Zealand foreign minister Phil Goff on why his government doesn't want the tour of Zimbabwe to go ahead

"He's just too big a name in cricket for them to let him go elsewhere ... They didn't have any problem with him working for them as a commentator in 2003 when he was serving his doping suspension."
A publicity expert with a rival network on speculation that adverse media coverage might cause Channel Nine to dump Shane Warne

"It doesn't make you mentally stronger, throwing a ball from a couple of metres."
Ricky Ponting dismisses suggestions that Simon Jones's altercation with Matthew Hayden gave England a psychological advantage

"As Graham Gooch always said, the realisation that time is tapping you on the shoulder doesn't creep up on you, it literally swamps you overnight."
Michael Atherton on the ageing of the Australians

"I think England will win a Test. My concern is Australia will probably win two."
Geoffrey Boycott reveals his deepest fears

"Anyone who believes President Robert Mugabe will lose sleep over New Zealand not coming to Zimbabwe might as well believe he is not his son's mother or her mother's daughter."
Editorial in the Zimbabwe Independent on why New Zealand's tour should go ahead

"We heard there were a few blinds rattling up there last night, but we thought it was just Andrew Symonds coming in late after another night on the town."
David Harker offers his thoughts on the ghostly happenings at Lumley Castle

"Ricky Ponting continues to believe that (unlike ghosts) the lbw law simply doesn't exist. And Andrew Symonds has to work out how to get his hip flask onto the field without the Sky cameras noticing."
South African journalist Dan Nicholl joins in on the "Pick On An Australian Week" fun and games

"We're sick of getting beaten and we are looking forward to getting our first win on the board."
Michael Clarke utters words we never thought we would hear from an Australian

"One day we'll lose the Ashes and it will be as horrific as waking up after a night on the drink in a room full of images of Camilla Parker Bowles."
Sydney's Daily Telegraph hits out at the "gloating pommies" who have been rubbing it in since the Bangladesh defeat

"Why would England hide me? Would Australia hide Glenn McGrath or Brett Lee?"
After his 5 for 33 against the Australians at Bristol, Steve Harmison questions the logic of resting him ahead of the Test series

"England talk themselves up every time and obviously they've got a bit better this year but our side's still proven."
Tennis star Lleyton Hewitt backs his Aussie mates to bounce back

"The number of fumbles, misfields and grabs at thin air brought to mind some England performances of the past ... a team full of dobbers and crap fielders? It has been said about every England touring team to Australia in the past 15 years. It's nice to be able to return the compliment."
Michael Atherton, so often on the losing end, turns the knife

"The kindest thing you can say about their performance is that it was shoddy but you can think of many stronger words to use."
Richie Benaud on Australia's current problems

"He got 96% of the vote - the only thing I could say is why didn't he get 100%?"
Sky commentator Michael Holding gives Mohammad Ashraful a perfect ten for his century against Australia which won him the Man-of-the-Match award almost unanimously, but not quite

"They have improved, but I still feel they haven't improved enough."
Glenn McGrath plays down the defeat in the Twenty20 match against England

"I think one of the bulls got amorous with a cow or perhaps another bull - I am not sure about the sexual orientation of bulls."
Karl Krikken, Derbyshire's 2nd XI coach, after their match against Leicestershire 2nds was held up by a rampaging bull that jumped the fence from a neighbouring field and chased the players and spectators for 20 minutes

"We'll have our work cut out against Bangladesh the way we're playing. We'll have a good long hard look at ourselves,"
Ricky Ponting after Australia's second defeat on their Ashes tour

"I don't even bother with it, it's rubbish."
Former England fast bowler Fred Trueman has a go at Twenty20 cricket

"I don't think we'll spend weeks analysing it. We will just laugh it all off."
Ricky Ponting reflects on Australia's 100-run defeat in the Twenty20 match at The Rose Bowl

"It was a bit of a lottery ....it means nothing."
Michael Vaughan on the same game

"The Barmy Army are an intelligent crowd and I'd be disappointed if they don't have a song ready for me for the start of the series."
Shane Warne clearly respects English audiences. Christopher Martin-Jenkins and Justin Langer would beg to differ ...

"I definitely believe if any of our batsmen get out to Giles in the Tests they should go and hang themselves. But I'm confident that won't happen."
Terry Alderman, the former Australian swing bowler, states quite unequivocally what he thinks of Ashley Giles the spinner

"Legends in their own lifetime will soon have to become legends in their own lunchtime."
Martin Johnson's writes in the Telegraph on the instant-gratification generation and the attraction of Twenty20 cricket

"The MCC wanted him to look, shall we say, less masculine. It was a toss-up who I was going to offend - Shane or the MCC."
Fanny Rush, whose new portrait of Shane Warne now hangs in the Lord's pavilion, speculates that she was asked to tone down his image

"There were seven internationals out there - it was a strong side and we gave them a whooping."
Darren Gough has a justifiable gloat, after picking up a hat-trick in England's rout of Hampshire

"Yes, Freddie's got a big wrist. He's got a big everything ..."
Michael Vaughan laughs off speculation about Andrew Flintoff's bowling action

"At times, even two brothers can have a little fight."
Shahid Afridi's take on his dressing-room clash with Younis Khan at Barbados

"It's just a case of me wearing a pair of shorts that I woke up with this-morning. I wear the Haviana Aussie thongs, I've got Aussie flags, Brazilian flags, whatever br>Kevin Pietersen explains his choice of shorts for the friendly game against the Australians at Arundel

"There's some quality fast bowlers. We saw that today with Chris Tremlett. He is a huge bloke and I felt like a midget."
Matthew Hayden meets his match

"I won the Man-of-the-Match award, despite bowling like a trollop for much of the game."
Matthew Hoggard puts his performance against Bangladesh in perspective

"One problem is television back in Bangladesh. I think players are influenced by watching India and Pakistan players like Tendulkar and Inzamam hitting the ball all over the place in matches."
The former Bangladesh coach Eddie Barlow blames the team's batting on watching too much TV

"We are more than happy to be talking to opposition players out on the field as long as it's not personal or abusive. I'm sure it will happen on this tour."
Ricky Ponting plans England's mental disintegration

"It's like a benefit match, is this. There'll be someone going round with a raffle before long."
David Lloyd gives his view on the generous offerings from the Bangladesh attack at Chester-le-Street

"If the process were a relay race, I think we dropped that baton a long time ago."
Viv Richards looks at the grim picture in the development process of West Indies cricket

"Four years down the track, if I'm still playing I might need to be knocked on the head."
Glenn McGrath gears up for what he thinks will be his last England tour

"The positions of Jupiter and Mars are not good. I wish I am wrong but this is what the stars tell."
Abdullah Shaukat Chowdhry, a 70-year-old astrologer from Lahore, predicts that the end is nigh - the end of Sachin Tendulkar's career, that is ...

"Herschelle has changed from being an irresponsible razzler into a well-groomed, professional man that some woman is going to be very proud of."
Ray Jennings, South Africa's outgoing coach, on the coming-of-age of Herschelle Gibbs

"Why do we need a Pom to help us out when we've just won the Pura Cup and there is plenty of young talent to foster and develop?"
Steve Waugh puts out the welcome mat for Graham Thorpe at New South Wales

"It's a nightmare. Andrew Caddick's helicopter is not big enough to ferry us around and Sanath Jayasuriya is exhausted already."
Somerset's chief executive Peter Anderson fumes about the long trips his club is forced to undertake

"The Australians certainly enjoy throwing around those soundbites. They like to have a little war of words before the series. But deep down they probably find it quite amusing."
Andrew Strauss gets into the mind of the Aussies

"At one stage I had to sit in with a lawyer and prove I could understand English. Seriously, mate. He sat there and said, 'I'm a bit embarrassed about this, but I need to know you understand English and can speak it properly.' I said, 'You are joking.' So he asked me where I was born and I said 'Brisbane'. He seemed happy that I understood the question."
Stuart Law explains what he had to go through to get British citizenship

"You have to be an athlete to be a cricketer. Boonie's record is pretty safe."
Michael Clarke explains why David Boon's drinking record on a flight to England won't be under threat from this Australian touring party

"Everybody says John Wright did a good job, but what exactly did he do? He could not rectify Sourav Ganguly's short-pitched delivery problem for five years."
Ashok Malhotra, the former Indian Test batsman, disappointed after not being considerd for the coaching position

"We want to keep up the tradition that Stephen started - but I suppose we'll run out of battlefields in the end."
It was Gallipoli under Steve Waugh in 2001 - now Australia's captain, Ricky Ponting, is to stop over in Northern France ahead of this summer's Ashes

"I've shifted to milkshakes, but I ensure that I get my daily quota."
Mahendra Dhoni makes sure that he drinks one litre of buffalo milk a day

"I'll play for England until I'm 65 if I'm chosen."
Jon Lewis says he isn't too bothered about entering Test cricket at the age of 30

"It's a terrible blunder ... appalling, pathetic and utterly predictable."
Ian Botham, the former England allrounder, describes the omission of Kevin Pietersen from the Test squad to face Bangladesh

"Imagine if you got him on a triple word score in Scrabble."
David Lloyd, the Sky Sports commentator, thinks of a use for all five first names of Chaminda Vaas

"To me, this time, it's Vaughan and Strauss. I haven't decided on one. I'm targeting two."
Glenn McGrath has pressing matters on hand ahead of the much-hyped Ashes

"There may be a career for me in cricket after football, though it would help if I knew the rules ..."
Aki Riihilahti, the Finnish midfielder, ponders a career change after taking part in his first game of cricket, during a practice session before Crystal Palace's crucial relegation decider against Charlton

"The entire notion of 'fusion' cooking belongs to that category of things - along with the England Test bowler Matthew Hoggard, and digital radio - that at first appear a complete waste of space, but gradually prove themselves a useful addition to human existence."
Matthew Norman, writing in the Sunday Telegraph magazine, offers an interesting critique of a London restaurant

"There are a lot of people who may not like the things I do, maybe things I do on the pitch, a bit of sledging, the way I act in the field, my cockiness."
Chris Schofield gives a few pointers as to why Lancashire decided to dispense with his services

"It's serious, spit-blood-in-the-sawdust stuff."
Michael Kasprowicz laughs about his experiences with boxing training in the last few months

"If Muttiah Muralitharan can be allowed to bowl, nobody under the sun should be stopped from bowling for suspect action."
Former Indian offspinner Rajesh Chauhan says the ICC treated Harbhajan Singh unfairly

"At least we were bowled out by someone with a Danish name."
Claus Hansen, chairman of the Danish cricket federation, after Northamptonshire's Charl Pietersen took 7 for 10 as Denmark were bowled out for 56 in the C&G Trophy

"We are forced to produce grass pitches and it is only a few weeks since the polar bears were walking in the Copenhagen streets."
Soren Nissen, chairman of the Svenholm club and a former vice-president of the Danish Cricket Association, offers a persuasive argument as to why their C&G clash against Northamptonshire is too early in the season

"It would be worth getting a pair just to walk out against the Aussies and hear what they had to say."
Stuart Law, Australia's England-qualified one-cap wonder, adds his thoughts to the sledging debate

"Chris Cairns's mother is probably a very good cricketer."
Brett Lee comments on Chris Cairns's statement about how even his mother could lead this great Australian side

"Our batsmen are not muppets. They are strong characters who have been through a lot as individuals and as a team and they know what's coming."
Graham Thorpe braces himself and his team-mates for a summer of sledging at the hands of the Australians

"I'm just telling him to cool man, chill man, because back in the dressing-room we have a double bed"
Billy Bowden tries, unsuccessfully, to persuade his umpiring colleague, Simon Taufel, look on the bright side of the latest rain-delay in Antigua

"Everyone will have to see Sourav's career in 360 degrees before the judgment on his career is passed"
Wasim Akram's geometry lessons to the Indian selectors

"Any Dainty-sponsored USA team will be so riddled with nepotism and mismanagement that calling it a 'USA team' would be a joke"
The outgoing president of the USACA, Gladstone Dainty, comes under fire from the ICC and local administrators

"When he asked me what I thought about his hairstyle I said, no matter what happened, a mother would always love her child."
Kevin Pietersen'smother hints that she feels much the same as the rest of us about her son's new coiffure

"I'm not going to push her to play cricket ... in fact, I would much rather she played golf. Spending my retirement years as a caddie would be pretty much the dream scenario."
New father Marcus Trescothick on daughter Ellie Louise

"My dad is 70, my mother is 60. The chances of another Kapil are close to zero."
Kapil Dev on being asked when India will see another Kapil Dev

"I am astonished over the language used by Woolmer. I had thought of him as an intelligent person."
Former Pakistan captain Aamer Sohail lambasts Bob Woolmer for saying that Shoaib Akhtar was not an integral part of the team

"Even my mother can lead this Australian side."
Chris Cairns's response when asked to compare the sides led by Ricky Ponting and Steve Waugh

"Indians are mad about the game. Sometimes, I do think they are mad. But the unbridled passion is infectious."
Don Bradman's views, as recalled by Richard Mulvaney, the Director of the Bradman Museum

"Cricket is a foreign game played in white flannels ... it is not our game, wrestling is. In fact, cricket should not be played at all. What baffles me is why Indians are so bothered about watching cricket"
Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mulayam Singh Yadav courts the popular vote

"I think I must be allergic to my passport."
Steve Harmison explains his homesickness

"Sometimes he turns up and he's got a face like a slapped arse and I think what the f*** am I doing here. Then sometimes he'll be taking the piss out of me. And we go out. Last week we went on the piss together and there's nowt wrong with that"
Physiotherapist Dave "Rooster" Roberts on life with Andrew Flintoff

"Too many people are there getting cheap wickets and cheap runs."
Shane Warne calls for a two-tier Test structure to eliminate one-sided games

"Time, and that's Sunday lunch, roast beef and all"
Umpire David Shepherd brightens the end-of-session announcement. The previous day he had told players "it's tea, and than means scones and Devonshire clotted cream". A career as a TV chef beckons after he retires in June

"I think we played bad cricket."
India women's captain Mithali Raj explains the details of why they lost to Australia in the World Cup final

"It is just tragic and ironic that a guy whose heart was metaphorically so big and a man who was so courageous that it was the thing in the end that cost him his life."
Former Tasmanian captain Jamie Cox laments the death of his team-mate Scott Mason

"If he could take 65 wickets occasionally bowling below his best, what sort of prospect does that make him at full potential?"
An anonymous Australian selector wonders about the possibilities with Shaun Tait, who struck 65 times in an outstanding Pura Cup season

"I know what cricket is, I've seen it on TV, but I can't play."
Maros Kolpak, the Slovakian handball player of Kolpak fame, may have had a big impact on cricket, but doesn't know one end of a bat from the other

"The decision will have to be taken if we are playing to be competitive or if we are just playing for the enjoyment of the game."
Stephen Jones, South Africa women's coach, gets tough about the future after his team were knocked out of the World Cup

"Those short days ... getting up at 7am and it's still dark. I'll get used to it, but I can't wait now for the season to start."
Stuart Law looks forward to another summer in England

"It's better to go at five to nine than at five past nine."
Umpire David Shepherd on his impending retirement

"Pietersen's arrival is causing unease among his fellow-professionals, many of whom regard him as a cocky little pillock."
Matthew Engel on England's new boy

"It wasn't a pre-planned thing, just go out there, see it and hit it, really."
Ricky Ponting makes blasting a 104-ball century seem like the easiest thing in the world

"Sehwag can change the course of a match with the ease of Moses parting the Red Sea."
Ian Chappell predicts an assault of biblical proportions

"I've learnt my lesson: I enjoy tea, but I've been told to put that on hold for a few days. All I've been doing all morning is drinking water and that's what I'll be doing from now on."
England A batsman Owais Shah reacts to being banned from drinking tea after over-consumption caused dehydration and cramp in Sri Lanka

"Some of them may not even be able to understand what Woolmer is intending to communicate."
Intikhab Alam, the former Pakistan captain, makes no bones about what he thinks of Bob Woolmer's methods

"I'm not a nervous person, particularly with my batting, because I'm not very good."
Stuart MacGill makes some candid admissions after steering NSW to a nail-biting one-wicket win in the Pura Cup final

"I'll walk you to the changing room. What are you averaging? You must know your average? 9? 10? Maybe 9.5, so we'll give you 10."
Mark Boucher tries his form of mental disintegration against Tatenda Taibu, as Zimbabwe disintegrate at Centurion Park

"Mark Boucher - not the brightest, but he is good at sledging."
Nasser Hussain on hearing Boucher's sledging during Soccer AM on Sky Sports

"It beats Monday morning at Chelmsford - all tea and Pimm's. The amount of times Steve Waugh said to me: 'Enjoy it Nasser, this is your last Test. We will never see you again.'"
Nasser Hussain on what proper sledging is really like - Aussie style

"I am going to make a promise to the foreign minister right now and that is that I will even try to understand cricket."
The US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, acknowledges the importance of the game in Indo-Pak relations, as she arrives in New Delhi

"It is not a matter of performance today, it's a matter of how much I'm getting and it's a real pity."
On the eve of his 100th Test, Steve Bucknor reflects on changing attitudes of players

"Going into the dole office and getting your £50 a week doesn't pay for a mortgage."
Former Lancashire and England legspinner Chris Schofield shows his financial awareness as he heads into the new domestic season without a county

"I felt that every day I was going to die."
Michael Slater explains how he felt after the onset of panic attacks while playing Test cricket and also commentating

"Jacques Kallis is an occasional bowler. By that, I mean he occasionally wants to bowl ..."
Charles Colvile comments on Kallis's new-found willingness to bend his back, as the hapless Zimbabweans line up for the slaughter at Centurion

"As far as I'm concerned it's all rumours and this is just a witch-hunt."
The secretary of a Leongatha District Cricket Association team vehemently denies that his side fed their opposition hash-cakes to gain an advantage in a vital relegation dogfight

"A few years ago England would have struggled to beat the Eskimos."
Ian Botham highlights how far England have progressed in recent years

"It's typical of English cricket. A tree gets in the way for 200 years and, when it falls down, instead of cheering they plant a new one."
The former Australian fast bowler, David Gilbert, on Kent's new lime tree

"It's time someone told them the truth and you can't have this cricket on the international arena. People sitting back and watching this have got to be saying that this is wrong ... however much they need their plum jobs."
Former Zimbabwe captain Dave Houghton calls on the ICC to take Zimbabwe out of the firing line

"In my view they have done the right thing by bringing a fit team, rather than bringing injured players."
Sourav Ganguly offers a pearl of wisdom on the Pakistan team selection

"Probably the only thing that's splitting the four of us at the moment is that three of us have Test fifties."
Glenn McGrath takes a lighter look at the stiff competition for three fast-bowling slots ahead of the first Test

"Maybe if I were a guy I would be playing cricket."
Tennis star Sania Mirza, India's first WTA tour winner, admits where her priorities lie

"I am afraid that if I start watching the game, I will be too distracted to get back to studies."
A Mumbai student admits to facing a dilemma

"He was a top man and a good professional. He was one of those who you know will never play a trick and you can ask him to do anything for you and he will. An unassuming man and a great loss to us all."
Geoff Boycott pays tribute to his former opening partner, Brian Luckhurst, who died of cancer on March 1, 2005, aged 66

"If those guys deserve to keep playing then I'll go 'Hee'."
Former New Zealand wicketkeeper turned commentator Ian Smith questions some of the selectors' choices

"We play entertaining cricket, not to be spat on or have cans thrown at you."
An unamused Matthew Hayden on the crowd behaviour during the ODI at Wellington

"It's a Catch-21 situation."
Kevin Pietersen struggles with the maths

"I am sure if they could have gone in with the players when they were taking a sh*t, they would have."
An unnamed source close to the West Indies squad on what they described as "intrusive" camcording by Digicel representatives in Australia

"If they had scored as many runs as they had women's phone numbers during the tour, West Indies would have won the series comfortably."
In a memo to his company chairman, Richard Nowell, the representative of West Indies' sponsors, Digicel, slams the team's attitude during their tour of Australia

"They'll give him a day off to get married but there's no time for a honeymoon."
Who'd get hitched in an Ashes year? Neil Fairbrother reveals that Andrew Flintoff's impending nuptials will be lacking somewhat in romance

"To be brutally frank, there are some pathetic Test teams around at the moment."
English Academy boss and former Australian wicketkeeper Rod Marsh rules himself out of the Bangladesh and Zimbabwe coaching jobs

"All the players want me in the team, as does the captain and the coach. It's only critics in the media who try to write me off and all I can do is keep proving them wrong."
Darren Gough delights in silencing his critics, after his displays for England in the one-day series against South Africa

"Youngsters need to learn good techniques ... they cannot do that by watching rubbish. There is nothing good about Twenty20 cricket. People who disagree don't know what they are talking about."
Michael Holding makes clear his views on Twenty20

"I'm not applying for anything. I think England have been very good to me, and as far as I'm concerned I'm staying within the bubble of English cricket."
So that's that, then. Duncan Fletcher quashes rumours that he is to apply for the vacancy as South Africa's coach

"What are they looking for in me? Is it only results? If it was results maybe they should have left the picking of the side to me, and I would have got the results."
South Africa's coach Ray Jennings smooth-talks the powers-that-be. His contract is up for renegotiation in May

"There should be some credibility with the umpires. They should be checked, too."
Former Pakistan captain Waqar Younis joins in the big umpiring debate

"It went 29-5 against us ... umpires are not cheats. I would never accuse them of that. But I do believe they are influenced by the way teams appeal and by the crowds."
Pakistan's coach Bob Woolmer after carrying out a secret review of questionable umpiring decisions in their matches against Australia

"I think it's a bit of a tired old format."
Australia's coach John Buchanan admits his feelings on one-day cricket

"I think everybody knows by now how much I miss home. I'd have been home in the second week if you'd have given me a chance."
Steve Harmison is candid in his admission that his time away from home is affecting him

"If we go through the usual scenario of snapshot versus movie length, we are in a period in Matthew's movie where we are in an ad-break. Right at this time, we are waiting for the ad-break to finish and get back to the real movie."
John Buchanan sheds light on Matthew Hayden's slump in form

"Rana Naved is nobody's pin up but he does not have to be. He has shown that good fast bowling is about much more than long run ups, duels with the speed camera or sleek hair styles..."
Shahed Sadullah, a columnist for the News, has a thinly veiled pop at a certain fast bowler who fancies himself as an aeroplane

"He's bowled like a camel and fielded like a drain."
Bob Willis takes a premature pop at England's final-over hero, Kabir Ali, who recovered from a woeful first two balls to secure a tie in the second one-day international at Bloemfontein

"It was more a means to an end than an end itself. It was your fun-size Mars bar; a little taste of cricket that, hopefully, would get people who merely tolerated cricket - rather than those who considered themselves fans of the game - to upgrade to one-day and maybe four- and five-day cricket."
Stuart Robertson, the marketing guru credited with devising Twenty20, explains it was never meant to be an assault on the more traditional game

"We're on TV so I can't swear."
Shane Warne reacts when told that Darrell Hair missed a no-ball during Warne's innings of 99 against New Zealand at Perth in 1999

"We are going to get rid of Aleem Dar and Steve Bucknor, we are going to shoot them."
Steve Bucknor explains the death threat he received before the Centurion Test

"I laughed at the opposition, with their swearing and 'traitor' remarks ... some of them can hardly speak English."
England's Pietermaritzburg-born batsman Kevin Pietersen winds up the locals

"Soon, when Twenty20 becomes more popular, people won't want to watch one-day cricket because it takes too long."
Australia's American-born fielding expert Mike Young

"On the last day of this tour I'm going to get one of Gough's tattoos with three lions and my number underneath it. That's not a Christmas present - it's with you for the rest of your life, so no one can take it away from me and say I'm not English."
Kevin Pietersen explains that a tattoo is for life, not just for Christmas

"Deadlines don't worry us. As long as we make good money everything will be fine."
An official of the BCCI confirms what we all suspected

"Little was more ridiculous than the shouts of 'easy, easy' from the self-styled Barmy Army towards the end. They had chanted themselves hoarse for much of the last two hours. Why the countries they invade are too polite to tell them the truth, heaven knows. Worthy souls dwell among them, no doubt. As a group, they too often demean English cricket. As Betjeman prayed of Slough: come friendly bombs and fall on them. Water bombs will do."
Christopher Martin-Jenkins loses patience with the Barmy Army in The Times after the South African series

"Shoaib just comes and talks and plays one game, and then gets injured. He just thinks he is too good. He's the only one who praises himself all the time, which means there is something seriously wrong with him."
Wasim Akram lets rip at Shoaib Akhtar

"Twenty20 is a joke. I wouldn't have enjoyed playing it at all."
Australian legend Doug Walters makes his position clear

"Limited-overs international status and records cover matches between national teams, not hotchpotch multi-national games with no significance beyond fundraising. In no sense should the game qualify for inclusion. This ruling ... will not have my support, and performances in the match will not be included in any records published under my name."
The noted statistician Bill Frindall's toys fly out of the pram after the ICC ruled that the tsunami relief matches would count as full ODIs

"I'm not sure if he's speaking in Afrikaans or not, but I try not to listen too closely."
Andrew Strauss on how he deals with Andre Nel's antics

"I might be old-fashioned but it looks nasty, it looks vindictive and there's no place for it on a cricket field. It's incessant and he's at it all the time."
Commentator David Lloyd on the schoolboy histrionics of Andre Nel

"He must enjoy playing cricket ... by the end of most games he can't have any match fee left. There's aggression and aggression, but when it happens every ball it just gets boring."
Ian Botham adds his views on Nel

"For Kentucky Fried Chicken. I am in need of some grease."
Matthew Hoggard tells Angus Fraser where he's going the morning after taking 7 for 61 in South Africa's second innings at Johannesburg.

"It is one thing having a hard nut as a coach, quite another having simply a nut."
South African journalist Neil Manthorp on coach Ray Jennings

"At tea-time he [Makhaya Ntini] seemed dull and out of it so I put him in an ice bath and it really made him mad ... he abused me and I said to the other bowlers they had to perform after tea or they would also need to cool off."
Quote ... Unquote's new best friend Ray Jennings explains how he motivated Ntini on the first day at the Wanderers

"Let me make it clear that a thorough review of management, player commitment and discipline is being carried out and those found short ... will not be saved."
PCB chairman Shaharyar Khan in a letter to the Pakistan team leaked to the press

"Usually they delight in telling you how badly you're going to be beaten, but this time they just wished me luck."
Stephen Fleming talks about his new experience with customs at Melbourne

"The fact that they remembered my name was amazing enough for me."
Alok Kapali on meeting his team-mates and opponents for Melbourne's charity ODI

"When I first played against Australia when I came here in 1994 I genuinely believed we could beat Australia. Obviously after we were 3-0 down I suddenly realised we couldn't."
Darren Gough on his steep learning curve

"I've read about the great spin bowlers of the past. They've bowled a bit of rubbish every now and then and nobody seemed to worry about it. All of a sudden it's against the law to bowl a half-tracker. That being the case I break the law regularly, but I have good numbers."
Stuart MacGill has a go at his detractors after leading Australia to a comprehensive win at Sydney

"Somebody told him to have spinach all the time, so he loves spinach and wherever he goes, he says spinach should be part of the diet, in Pakistan particularly. His teammates tease him and call him Popeye the sailor man."
PCB operations manager Zakir Khan on Abdul Razzaq's odd diet, which doctors believe led to his collapse during the Melbourne Test

"You're welcome to him."
BBC cricket correspondent Jonathan Agnew on being asked if he missed Geoff Boycott's opinions on the network. Boycott had been less than charitable in his views on Agnew on a rival station

"It has cost me a lot, I'm playing a free game."
Danish Kaneria rues his two-word outburst at the SCG that resulted in being fined his entire match fee

"Because they are white, I am sorry to say, and I am black, I am out of cricket and they're still playing."
Saleem Malik makes clear why he thinks Shane Warne and Mark Waugh weren't banned for match-fixing

"He smiles at me every day and I smile at him every day, so it goes all right."
Bennett King, the West Indian coach, explains that everything is fine between him and Brian Lara

"A bloke's bowling at 150kph trying to rip the fingers off your arms or probably even worse. It gets your blood going and the adrenalin pumping. You are in a fight. And to me that's what Test cricket is all about."
Justin Langer on the joys of facing Shoaib Akhtar

"Hawk-Eye to me is just a cartoon and I'm yet to work out how that graduate can work out where the ball is going to go. You cannot possibly project where it's going to go"
Former Test umpire Dick French on the increasing use of technology