James Lawton: Boycott's battling quality is needed by England

Some flak, you may not be totally surprised to hear, has been encountered here since the recent suggestion that Ian Botham might just be the man to put a little iron back into the soul of English cricket. It was – let's be honest – a statement of emotion rather than relentless analysis, but the general point does, I believe, hold up.

As England approach another ordeal of fire in Australia the need for some positive leadership, and direct personal responsibility (beyond the usual whipping boy captain) for what happens out on the field, can rarely have been so desperate.

My critics, however, rather miraculously do not include Botham's old team-mate and rival, Geoff Boycott. Beefy and Boycs have, at a guess, as much philosophical compatibility as Genghis Khan and St Anthony of Padua. However, my conversation with Boycott the other day was about something rather more basic than the renewal of English pride on a sports field.

Boycott is a little weary from radiology treatment for his throat cancer, but he is as belligerently combative as ever. He sees it simply as another battle to be won. His waging of it, in the absence of any new initiatives from Lord's, is certainly, in its way, no less valuable to the perspective of a suffering team than the still inspirational meaning of Botham's career.