Sports Letters: Cricket needs more charisma

Sir: Having witnessed the latest debacle by the England cricket team at Lord's by the customary colourless crew of percentage performers, with the exceptions of Chris Read and Andy Caddick in England's second innings, the undersigned submit that the "grafting line and length" philosophy has been tried and found wanting for long enough.

The time has surely come to pick a team which, win or lose, has some spirit of adventure and derring-do: players in the Corinthian mould who believe that the bat's secondary function is to defend the wicket, but that first and foremost it is for scoring runs; and that the ball is provided for the taking of wickets and not just to be delivered down a six-inch corridor on or outside the off-stump.

The following, we submit, would make up a side of no little cricketing charisma, capable of providing a champagne spectacle whether in victory or defeat: Knight (Warwickshire), Trescothick (Somerset), Adams (Sussex, vice-capt), Maynard (Glamorgan, capt), Flintoff (Lancashire), Brown (Surrey), Read (Nottinghamshire, wicketkeeper), Tudor (Surrey), Cork (Derbyshire), Gough (Yorkshire) or Caddick (Somerset), Tufnell (Middlesex).

Whatever the result, they would be well worth the price of admission.

TRISTAN YORK and TIM WARE

London