It's your turn Monty, don't waste it

Sometimes an opportunity arrives which really can’t afford to be squandered.

Graeme Swann’s retirement prior to the fourth Test has given Monty Panesar a gilt-edged chance to re-establish himself as England’s premier spinner.

Whether he would’ve been preferred to Swann in now only a matter of guesswork – I don’t think Panesar would’ve been selected but I don’t know for sure – but he’s in now and he should sense that the road ahead has few obstacles.

That he is even in Australia comes down to the fact that Simon Kerrigan was shown to be way off the mark following a harrowing debut at The Oval and that the spin bowling cupboard in the county game, while not empty, has little to warrant discussion.

Panesar, despite an average 2013 season that saw him move clubs, gain infamy for urinating on a nightclub doorman while half-cut, and pull up few trees on the field, is now the best that we’ve got.

And if he can’t see that fate has handed him something of a lottery ticket then he needs to be examined.

With Ben Stokes’ emergence as an all-rounder of substance, there should be a space for a spinner regardless of conditions which is not
the way things would’ve panned out has he not appeared.

Four bowlers, with a spinner not entirely trusted, does not an effective combination make but this won’t be a worry once Sri Lanka come to town in June.

Now Swann is out of the equation, Andy Flower and Alastair Cook will be all too aware that, certainly in the near future, it is really Panesar or nobody.

And while the gameplan won’t necessarily change as they aren’t going to rip up their blueprint, however poorly they have done in this series, it is a case of heading back in time.

The saying of ‘you should never go back’ may well surface in certain situations, but England have had no choice and they now need to have some faith.

A record of 166 wickets at a shade under 35 isn’t too shabby by any means but it was what Panesar didn’t bring to the party that proved to be his undoing once Swann was established and it will be the same factors that will now have to tolerated.

When Shane Warne commented that Panesar had not played a certain number of Tests but one Test a certain number of times, he may have been a touch cynical but it was clear where he was coming from.

An obvious lack of cricketing development highlighted a naivety that had existed in Panesar the bowler since he started out in the professional game at Northamptonshire and which, although not to the same extent, still exists.

There isn’t much in the way of variation and a heavy reliance on accuracy and a quick pace but these don’t constitute a crime and this isn’t likely to change given the stage of his career.

He still can’t field for toffee and the groundsmen crank up the roller when he wanders out with bat in hand but what the hell.

Panesar is where England are at and given that a few months ago he had been all but discarded this is something of a turnaround, brought about by a dramatic case of stage fright and an unexpected departure.

Lady Luck does work in a mysterious manner.