Lord's Diary

What's in a name? The question may well have crossed the mind of the Indian fast bowler known as Shanthakumaran Sreesanth. Or of other southern Indians such as Gundappa Viswanath, Krishnamachari Srikkanth or Lakshmipathy Balaji.

These are not their names at all. In southern India there is no custom of family names, merely of given names. There has been confusion about Sreesanth since he made his Test debut against England last year in Nagpur. For years he was plain Sreesanth, the name given to him by his parents, or S Sreesanth at a stretch, the initial standing for Shanthakumaran, which was his father's given name.

However, the idea at first took root that he was Sree Sreesanth. He explained this was wrong, and gradually he has become Shantha Sreesanth. But this too is incorrect. He is certainly not Sri Sreesanth as he appeared in the papers last week. He said that he did indeed have two names. "I am called Sree Santh," he said. But this announcement has perplexed Indian journalists whom he told last year that he wished to be known only as Sreesanth (one word).

Gundappa Viswanath was, technically, merely Viswanath, Gundappa being his father's name. Srikkanth was not Kris, Balaji not Lakshmipathy. As for VVS Laxman, that is a story for another day. Western culture probably drives the need for at least two names. They can com-fort themselves with the fact that what we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.

Cap on way to snowy peak

Chris Tremlett became the 634th England Test player in all and the 81st to make his debut at Lord's. Of the 26 fast bowlers to have done so, three took more than 200 wickets: Alec Bedser, John Snow and Matthew Hoggard. But Stanley Christopherson, Jack Durston and Simon Brown never played again.

It's not good to pep-talk

There is another Lord's debut. This is the first Test for Adam Mountford, the new 'Test Match Special' producer. If he planned phone-in competitions by way of a pep-up for the programme he probably abandoned the idea by Thursday lunchtime.

Colly's first wobble

Paul Collingwood notched his first duck in his 46th innings, having scored more Test runs before doing so than anybody before. But the longest sequence without a duck remains David Gower's 119 innings.