Mushy pleas

Headline writers were denied the ideal excuse for a bit of wit at Lord's today. "Aga too hot for Onions" would have been a good headline if Graham Onions, the MCC fast bowler, hadn't fallen to Ryan Harris instead. Rageb Aga, Sussex's fast-medium bowler, will have to wait for his day in the pun. Perhaps Will Beer, the young Sussex leg spinner, will be used in a headline instead if MCC crumble on a drying pitch on the final day. "Beer and sun prove too much for MCC"?

Of course, the Sussex leg spinner that most fear is Mushtaq Ahmed, who will soon join the county for his sixth season with them, having taken 459 wickets in the previous five as Sussex won the championship three times. Yet Chris Adams, the Sussex captain, said that the club's success was due to more than just one man. "I'd like to think that Mushy relies on other players as much as we rely on him," he said. "Some of the catches Richard Montgomerie has taken off Mushy's bowling have been ridiculous. And while he has been a gift for us, if he went to another county it wouldn't mean they would win the championship." He's right: in Mushy's eight years with Somerset, they won diddly-squat.

Mushtaq could have missed this season after the row about him playing in the Indian Cricket League. At the eleventh hour the Pakistan and English boards agreed he could play. "The right decision has been made, but it's been a dramatic few weeks for everyone," Adams said. "Mushy has given so much to the championship and the game in general that it would have been a travesty if he had been banned."