Mark Ramprakash moves to 98
That’s 98 first-class hundreds, you understand. OBVIOUSLY he’s gone past a hundred in the match.
And obviously he’s not out as well. He’s just returned to the crease and Lancashire’s bowlers will be drying their eyes. Mark Ramprakash has hit a hundred in each of his last three championship innings, all of which were against Lancashire.
Generally speaking we’re against bringing back older players for England, but if someone’s averaging over 100 every single season and has 98 first-class centuries to their name, it doesn’t really matter if they’re 20 or 50. That batsman is the best there is. There isn’t a decision to be made if you’re an England selector. It’s just something you do, like eating meals or brushing your teeth.
If a cricketer’s taken the trouble to get so accomplished at batting that they can outperform all of their peers to such a frightening degree, then you don’t just owe that player a place in the England team, you owe it to the public, because everybody wants to know just how good that batsman is and they all suspect it’s ‘very’.
Owais Shah knows he needs to do better than Mark Ramprakash to get into the England team and he too scored a hundred yesterday.
