New Zealand tour of England

Derbyshire have signed Hamish Rutherford.

If Kent don't select Tredwell ahead of Adam Riley  v Glamorgan on Sunday after Peter Moores has so graciously made him available to his county , Mark Robinson should make an immediate phone call to Canterbury to propose that Sussex take him on loan again.

Tredwell needs first-class cricket to stay in the Test match  frame so its hard to see how Kent could say 'no'.

Encouraging for the health of the game and the validity of touring matches that Somerset have selected a strong squad for the match against New Zealand starting today:

PD Trego*, Abdur Rehman, TB Abell, J Allenby, AWR Barrow†, TLW Cooper, JH Davey, BGF Green, TD Groenewald, JC Hildreth, JG Myburgh, C Overton

No Trescothick or Thomas but plenty of other first teamers and hopefully a chance to see if C Overton has recovered from the injury sustained on England A duty.

Santner www.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/player/502714.html, mediocre batsman, journeyman spin bowler

Duffy www.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/player/547766.html  promising fast-medium right-arm bowler

Wheeler www.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/player/440523.html left-armer, on the quick side

Yes, they are filler for the players in the IPL. I like the fact that New Zealand are realistic, accept that if their stars aspire to the world stage then they will have to cover for them sometimes.

Wheeler "left-armer, on the quick side" - 7 overs, 5 maidens, 6 runs, 4 wkts .  Two clean bowled, one lbw and one nicking to the keeper. You don't often get a morning's work like that on the Taunton 'road'. The Kiwis should ask him to stay on, even after the IPL contingent arrives!

Restricting ourselves to those available for selection, what do we think the team to be selected by Whitaker, Newell,Fraser and Farbrace might be? Note that according to Mikes Selvey in the Guardian Strauss is not likely to be involved in selection this summer while he reviews the selection process.

After the disastrous selection cock-ups for the West Indies, Lyth must be certain to open with Cook and ought to get a run of these two Tests whatever else happens. Ballance and Root are unchallenged, at present, at 3 and 5, and it would be unlike England if they didn't pick Bell, the only place that Pietersen could have fitted in. I have argued for some time that Bell can look magnificent, but too often lapses and doesn't seem up for the struggle, and not always when the competition is at its fiercest.His time has come and gone almost without noticing it, and that is extraordinary for a player who has been in the side for more than 10 years now, and has played over 100 Tests and scored 22 100s.  For that reason I would have picked Taylor as the best representative of his generation, as a prospective captain, and as someone whose career has been shunted to the sidelines rather unfairly and for reasons  not related to his own performance.

Ideally Moeen Ali ought to be challenging Ben Stokes at No 6 as an all-rounder, but Moeen has found it difficult to know when to play his shots against fast bowling and Ben Stokes is still not a Test standard bowler. If they both play, and Buttler too, then none of them seem to be in quite the most effective positions anywhere between 6 and 8 and this affects the balance of the team. Time is running out to sort out this riddle, and if the weaknesses from the West Indies are repeated against New Zealand we will have to experiment with at least two positions in the opening Ashes match. Buttler has to work on his wicket-keeping, attractive though his stroke play is. At present he is Matt Prior in his first tenure, around 2007-8, and we need him to be the Prior of 2010- early 2013.

If all those three play then 9, 10 jack will be AN Other and Broad, Anderson. Jordan could be replaced by Woakes, if he were fit and playing, but in his absence the other fast bowling candidates - Rushworth, Brooks, Finn - are all very indifferent batsmen, which would bring us back to the three No 11s of the 99 vintage against New Zealand. Mark Wood is a better bat, as he showed last week, but unlike Lyth he didn't have a custom-made slot waiting for him, and he might be in the squad but likely to be omitted, the traditional fate for bowlers whose promise is only grudgingly acknowleged. Again, unless there is a disaster or serious injury, the team for the First NZ Test will almost certainly play the Second match. The whole learning opportunity of the West Indies tour was squandered before that misbegotten expedition took to the skies.