Livin' on a prayer

According to this blog site, a special World Cup Day of Prayer will take place this Sunday.

Whether island parishes will be praying for a logistical nightmare-free tournament and for all stadia to be finished on time is not yet known, but it will mark less than a month until the Opening Ceremony, although by all accounts much of the building work and new hotels have been completed.

While we're on the subject of churches and the Caribbean, I recall an anecdote that a tour manager for Gullivers Sports told me in India last year.

I was interviewing him about tour highlights and his favourite one concerning Steve Harmison's 7 for 12 in Jamaica a few years ago. He had dropped off a few clients at the local church where there was a morning service. It soon became apparent that the pastor was listening to the cricket as he kept checking up the score on his radio. Just as he was about to start his sermon he told the congregation that GBH was going through the West Indies and that the English contingent should get down to the ground sharpish. They duly obliged.

Melbourne (mellow) drama

Last night, a reporter cousin and I were drinking with some locals. Word spread that Shane Warne was going to announce his retirement. A quick phone call to Cricket Australia put the story to bed: nothing in it.

This morning, the world's media crashed the MCG for the final Test chapter in Warnie's legendary and entertaining career. I've written an online piece for Cricket World Magazine on today's events, which you can read here.

It was clearly the Warne way to quit at the top. He also stated his intentions on getting his home life back on track, and one thing that struck me was the fact that if he intends on doing so why is he playing for Hampshire for the next two years?

The England team's media managament have also jumped on today's news and decided it was probably a good time to bury semi-bad news as they say, with Steve Harmison announcing his retirement from the one-day game.

Anyway, what can Warnie achieve in his two more years with Hampshire? Will he be a good commentator? Feed your comments...