Cricket: Rhodes going in the right direction

IF Commercial Union are seeking a new representative, they could do a lot worse than employ the chairman of selectors. Ray Illingworth, it seems, is not in the business of making a crisis out of a drama.

'I'm elated with the way we fought,' Illingworth asserted last night. 'It was a tremendous performance. We probably didn't get quite enough runs in the first innings, and they probably got too many, but from then on we had to fight, and we did.'

Tense, nervous headache? Not our Illy. 'No trouble. There was a little Yorkie in there. I enjoy watching this kind of cricket. Rhodes was winding them up out there. He's got a good temperament. As the England captain, Mike Atherton, said, he looks like he's been playing Test cricket for 10 years. He's the sort of cricketer I like.

'Rhodes showed an awful lot of gumption,' Atherton enthused. 'It's a pity one or two of the other batsmen didn't show the same qualities earlier.' Ken Rutherford, New Zealand's captain, confessed to feeling deflated but took Rhodes's time-wasting in good heart. 'If we were in the same position we would have done the same. It was irritating and he got the message a couple of times. Nothing too heated, though.

'We were always a wicket short each session and it would have been nice to have the seamers on at the end, but we've shown great character to come back after our drubbing at Trent Bridge. The turn- around was quite incredible. We outplayed them session by session and we deserve credit for that. The talent in our side has been unearthed.'

Keen as Rutherford was to distribute the credit evenly, Dion Nash's record-breaking performance was patently a source of pleasure. 'Up to now he has performed spasmodically at Test level, but the trick is to convince yourself that you can do it. Once you do that, you can do it again.'

Atherton added: 'We warned against complacency before the Test,' he insisted. 'We didn't play well, and they played much better. We under-achieved. I can't put my finger on it. We weren't hopelessly bad, just a bit off- colour in all departments. We feel we've got the nucleus; it's just a case of finding the right combination.'