Giles appointed as England Selector

In a shake up of the England selection process, David Graveney has not been given the job of full time England selector. Although not technically the same job as his previous "chairman of selectors" job, so he cannot be thought of as having been exactly sacked, the new job is roughly the equivalent, so the outcome is the same.

Geoff Miller has been appointed to the role and Ashley Giles will be one of two part-time selectors, who with Miller and Peter Moores will make up a four man panel. The BBC gets a few things regarding Giles slightly wide of the mark. Firstly reporting that his elevation was a surprise, which if they'd bother to keep an eye on the procedings and who was being interviewed, it would not have been. They also seem mildly surprised given his relative youth, and that would be true in a normal selection panel, however this is supposed to be a revised method, he is only recently out of the England fold, so has maybe more knowledge of the current climate in International cricket and what it takes to play it, but perhaps more obviously, as a director of cricket for a county side, he is going to be seeing a fair few players during the season in any case.

Although I cannot be convinced yet that he will make a sucess of such a demanding schedule, I would like to extend my sincere good luck wishes to Ashley.

Incidentally for those season's raggy bear watchers out there - the story was reported here at 16.31 and on the BBC at 16.34 - you know who's first for WCCC news.