As the aborted election campaign hotted up last week the wily 63-year-old Yorkshireman had cast aspersions on Graveney's

As the aborted election campaign hotted up last week the wily 63-year-old Yorkshireman had cast aspersions on Graveney's credentials to be chairman because he had never played for England. Curtis, for one, felt they had rushed through Graveney's nomination and that he had "been used a little bit".It would seem that Graveney was not the first choice of some counties to confront Illingworth. John Barclay, England's assistant manager on their winter tours, was diplomatic as ever but confirmed: "It's fairly common knowledge that a county or two approached me in the immediate aftermath of the World Cup. "We didn't have an inkling about it until Friday morning," he said. Graveney, apologetic for any upset he may have caused, pulled out of the ballot late on Friday afternoon.Warwickshire, whose spokesmen throughout the week had been denying any possibility of a clash of interests and had introduced a note of barnstorming electioneering to the proceedings, suddenly had no senior officials available for comment. "It's fair to say we're surprised and extremely disappointed." Others were more disappointed in Warwickshire's behaviour. Dennis Amiss, the chief executive, was on his way north for a social engagement, the county chairman MJK Smith was said to be "unavailable unfortunately".It was left to Amiss's personal assistant, Keith Cook, to field calls.

Having been allowed to retire from playing, at last I can get away from the game in April for the first time."His holiday was to be interrupted by Curtis informing him that he should withdraw his name from the ballot or, presumably, resign as PCA secretary. By this time Graveney was in Florida, on holiday visiting his father.The day before flying out, saying that he was honoured to be nominated and did not see the ballot as a head-to-head with Illingworth, whom he had been privileged to serve with as a selector, Graveney had added with a laugh: "It's wonderful to be going on holiday at this time of the year. We still hadn't discussed it when the nomination was officially announced."Phone calls followed between Curtis and other PCA officers such as Jack Bannister, the organisation's president, and then between Curtis and Graveney. "My county chairman [Duncan Fearnley] told me what was going on.

But what was being written in the papers was my only other source of information David didn't approach me about the nomination. The chairman of the PCA, the Worcestershire captain, Tim Curtis, heard the unfolding story about his secretary's likely challenge to Illingworth in the same way as most people, through reports in the papers."I picked up something early in the week, probably on Monday," Curtis said. Both the player and the county most vociferous in backing him, Warwickshire (though Surrey also nominated him), denied there would be any clash of interests.However, Graveney never formally approached his employers to tell them of his nomination. He might have been forced to represent a player for a disciplinary lapse and censure him at the same hearing.

He'd be a good chairman."But a lurking threat to Graveney's candidacy was his full-time job as secretary of the Professional Cricketers' Association, and the conflict that there could have been with becoming chairman of selectors, which is not automatically a paid post. "I had a couple of fall-outs with him when we were both at Gloucestershire and he was captain [Broad left the county] but he has tremendous knowledge and a relaxed, laid-back attitude. Paul Parker, the former Sussex captain who played under Graveney at Durham, spoke of his unflappability, his balanced thinking and his care for the game and those under him.The former England opening batsman Chris Broad was, less expectedly, equally glowing. Geoff Cook, the Durham manager who hired Graveney as the county's first captain when they were elevated to the Championship, said he was a deep thinker about the game and a skilful communicator. He had the seemingly essential virtues of being young (43 actually, but still only a season into retirement), close to the players, sensible and vastly knowledgeable. Seeking testimonials about his worthiness for the post before he pulled out was to be confronted with a blanket of tributes. Not only are England incapable of picking a winning team, they are also completely hopeless at deciding who should select the bunch of losers in the first place. Graveney, a selector for a single season after a long and worthy career with three counties as a left-arm spin bowler, was perhaps a surprise challenger for Ray Illingworth's job.

IT WAS all doubtless an unfortunate misunderstanding, but somehow it embodied the sad state of English cricket. When David Graveney, the secretary of the Professional Cricketers' Association, withdrew from the ballot to decide the chairman of selectors amid confusion and some little rancour late last week the inference was easy to draw. We have been repeatedly reminded for 50 years that our footballers fall well short of those of countless foreign countries in skill and technique, and yet it still comes as a surprise. One television gentleman called it "disturbing".Truth is that Forest did well in the first leg to get an away goal and on Tuesday pounded Bayern for 30 minutes in which they could have scored twice but did not have a shred of luck, as Klinsmann confirmed. Then Forest's goalkeeper, Mark Crossley, made an appalling mistake to let Bayern score and 13 minutes later another crappy goal gave the Germans a lead that could only be overtaken if Forest risked everything in attack.Bayern took full advantage and scored five goals on the night.