Tomorrow, 11am.

Somehow England against Pakistan always stirs up something bad. We've had Gatting vs Rana, Pakistan vs Darrell Hair and most recently of course, spot fixing. Mohamed Amir is back and playing, which is.... I don't really know how to feel about it. Only Broad and Cook played in the Lords test in 2010, so they have more to feel aggrieved about than most. I expect they'll be offering only media-training castrated soundbites about just getting on with the game, so it will be down to the crowd to be shouting "no-ball!" as loudly as they can whenever he bowls.

From an England perspective, Gaz Baz is back! For no obvious reason! Plus either Jake Ball or Toby Roland-Jones will play. Or maybe both I guess. No problem with Roly-Jo being picked super consistent over the last few years for Middlesex.

Ballance being picked does give us the chance to play The_Excession's world famous blind stats comparison game! This season, Ballance's first class record reads 471 runs at a thundering 33.64. Undoubtedly recall form. But who are these former England players, none of whom have ruled themselves out of England duty (so no Tresco, 671 @ 44.73 or Trott, 817 @ 74.27 since you ask), and their first class records this year?

Player A: 468 runs @ 42.54
Player B: 609 runs @ 55.36
Player C: 665 runs @ 47.50
Player D: 773 runs @ 40.68
Player D: 871 runs @ 72.50