By illuminating contrast, Surrey look like winning the championship mainly because too few of their opponents have been able to recover once they have hit trouble. There have been 171 four-day championship matches so far, four of which have finished in two days, 37 in three and a good many more have been affected by the weather. The games which actually last for four days are a in a clear minority. It is not at all what the advocates of four-day cricket had in mind.
This is at the heart of the problem everyone is keen to solve: the need for a 'competitive' national side. ``If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew, to serve your turn long after they are gone . . . ``
Those working on any possible restructuring of the championship need to ask why the evidence points to the persistent failure of counties to recover once one side has got a big score and the other one has begun to struggle in response.
If pitches are to blame, as up to a point they must be, the England and Wales Cricket Board will have to reconsider their guidelines, but time and again this year we have had more than 15 wickets falling on the first day, only for umpires to conclude that it is bad batting, not bad pitches, which has caused the collapse. There are only three other possible reasons: superb bowling which, much as we would love to believe it, is clearly not very common; bad technique; and mental weakness.
Whatever can be done with the professional structure, work is already in hand to improve the technical and mental quality of those who reach the professional level. Since retiring at the end of last season while still at the peak of his powers as an opening batsman for Glamorgan, Hugh Morris has completed a review of national coaching which promises to create a far more efficient system for coached and coaches alike.
Co-ordinated coaching, allied to the moves already under way to sharpen up adult recreational cricket, should move the UK nearer to that Australian virtuous circle wherein the young talent is spotted, sifted, nurtured and matured, enabling the international side to be refreshed as necessary with gifted, hardened players who can be drafted into a strong side without any fear of the whole experience being too much for them.
It was Micky Stewart who started the process of revamping the NatWest Development of Excellence and Rover National Coaching schemes which have already brought more coherence to the business of encouraging and developing young cricketers.
Nearly 30,000 coaching awards have been made over the last 25 years to those who have sought voluntarily to give something back to the game by doing some coaching in schools or clubs. Next year, the former Warwickshire and Worcestershire left-hander, Gordon Lord, will take over from Bob Carter the essential task of educating future coaches.
There will be five new levels for coaches. Level one courses start regionally round the country for volunteers from Sept 1 and the object is to pass on basic skills designed for stimulating the interests of beginners in clubs and schools.
At all levels there will be an emphasis on sports science as well as on technique and coaches will be helped to analyse and to communicate clearly, with groups as with individuals. From next year, new level two coaches and those with existing senior and advanced coaching awards will be invited to county-based sessions leading to the third level, where coaching will be aimed at talented youngsters and experienced club cricketers. At levels four and five the need will be for articulate and well qualified coaches to work with county cricketers and international players.
Morris sums up the various facets of coaching as ``technical, tactical, physical, mental and lifestyle, by which I mean advice about drugs, diet, wider education and the need for ambitious cricketers to become articulate''.
All these areas will be examined at a world cricket coaching conference at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham next June 1 and 2, when anyone who is interested in cricket coaching can attend. The World Cup will be in full swing and Morris has already issued invitations to Bob Woolmer, Terry Jenner, Dennis Lillee, Desmond Haynes and, from further afield, Frank Dick.
Morris is keen to get more former Test cricketers interested in the art of coaching but says there is ``no glass ceiling'' to prevent players of lesser attainment from reaching high levels as coaches. He points to Arsène Wenger as a classic example.
The ECB's technical director sees less need for change in the development of excellence schemes which already identifies many of the best young cricketers from the 1.3 million under 12 and puts them on a theoretical road to the top via national squads at under 13, 15, 17 and 19.
Morris will tell the ECB when he makes his report at the end of this season that the need is less for a finishing academy along the lines of those in Australia, South Africa and New Zealand than for a national cricket centre, catering for special training of many different ages and teams.
The Test against Sri Lanka later this week and the tour of Australia later this year may or may not put a stop to the encouraging progress of Alec Stewart and his team. The really good news is that changes well below the surface are working towards a production line which should ensure that the current upturn is more than just a flash in the pan.