Thursday, 25th January 2007 at 3:10 pm

I have a cunning plan…

Why is Herschelle celebrating in the accompanying picture, when he’s just had Richie Benaud uphold his ban? Quite simple: an act of genius has played out perfectly. Make sure the stump microphone is on, make some inflammatory comments, and ensure you get a ban - but do so a Test early, so that when the inevitable appeal is launched, you play the crucial extra game. Then take your punishment, and while your team-mates walk out onto Newlands in 42 degree heat (Cape Town is burning up at the moment, literally and figuratively), you have a gentle day’s relaxation, and then make good on your true aim: spend Saturday in the air-conditioned, model-saturated, champagne-soaked confines of the J&B VIP marquee at the J&B Met. Which means that unless South Africa bowl Pakistan out for 12, score at 15 an over, and bowl them out for eight on the second morning, there’ll only be one cricketer living it up at the racing come Saturday. And to think Herschelle is sometimes accused of being one of sport’s lesser intellectuals…