There are games that take more strength, more speed, ones that require a higher level of fitness, and ones that require deeper resources of endurance. But no game equals cricket in its all-round development of all the aptitudes. There are games that contain a greater concentration of excitement per playing hour. But no game approaches cricket in its blend of subtlety, entertainment, sudden thrill and sustained intellectual interest. Cricket, like no other game, takes the whole of a man - his body, soul, heart, will and wits.

Cricket - real cricket; that is, Test cricket - has been stigmatised as being too slow, too leisurely, lacking in colour and excitement. I believe this is simply one more aspect of the malignant modern appetite for instant stimulation and quick-fire titillation. The slash-bang games may satisfy the craving for a quick thrill, but they bear about the same relationship to a good game of cricket as instant food does to a superbly cooked gourmet dinner.

It is like the difference between lust and love. There is, it is true, the temporary excitement of a passionate one-night stand. But who can doubt that the more mature, the more beguiling, the longer-lasting love affair provides the more challenging and the deeper experience?

So it is with Test cricket. Like any lasting love affair a good Test match has its moments when the play is ordinary, slow-moving, and even boring. But the complex interplay of emotion, psychology, collective bonding and individual character, allied with the sudden bursts of excitement and the unexpected twists of fortune, add up to an experience that far outweighs the temporary and quick-fading lust for instant gratification that so many other sports supply.

One of the glories of cricket is the way the drama of a match develops, how the pace varies from the leisurely to the suddenly lethal, how the plot thickens, and the subplots are interlinked as the play goes on, how the heroes and the villains take the stage with time enough to act out their roles. A good Test match is the equal of a five-act masterpiece of the stage. Even the best of the other games can really only compare with one-act spectacles that attract those whose attention span is brief and whose imaginations are lacking.