LAWRENCE BOOTHS TOP SPIN: Come in No 14! Are Cook and Kieswetter Englands ultimate partners on time?

Craig Kieswetter may just possess that crucial ingredient, the one which sportsmen hate to admit exists but without which no successful career would be possible. The ingredient is called luck.

Its not so much that he was badly dropped only four runs into his 66-ball 81 for England Lions against the full England team in Dubai last week, although that certainly helped.

But his official transition from a South African to an Englishman coincides a) with a trip to the subcontinent, where one-day openers tend to enjoy themselves, and b) with a trip to Bangladesh, where one-day openers tend to enjoy themselves very much indeed.

Openign door: Craig Kieswetter hits a six against Bangladesh Cricket Board XI

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Theres more. England wont say so, because it would insult the incumbents, but they are desperately seeking an opener capable of by-passing the infield, or at least bruising hands when he doesnt. Kieswetter could be the man.

Here, though, is the thing: assuming Kieswetter makes his international debut in Dhaka on Sunday, he and presumably the captain Alastair Cook will form Englands 14th one-day opening partnership since the end of the 2007 World Cup.

Fourteen! And in only the 58th game a tinker every fourth match on average (see table below). Englands selectors have been indecisive in their time, but their experimentation with nine different openers in two years Kieswetter would become the 10th may just sum up the mercurial nature of a one-day side that can lose 3-1 to New Zealand twice in a matter of months and thrash South Africa 4-0 soon after; lose 6-1 at home to Australia, then respond with a series win in South Africa.

There have, its true, been spells of consistency. Cook and Matt Prior were given nine matches together at the top of the order after Michael Vaughan played his last one-day game in Barbados in April 2007. And Cook and Phil Mustard opened in 10 successive innings in Sri Lanka and New Zealand in 2007-08. Those, however, are the two longest alliances, and they produced only three stands of 50 or more in 19 attempts.

Englands decision to stick with Cook was partly the product of his 102 against India at the Rose Bowl in August 2007 Andrew Strausss 105 in Guyana last year is so far the only other one-day hundred by an England opener since the last World Cup. But it may also have been influenced by the selectors desire to turn him into Englands captain-in-waiting.

Yet even Geoff Miller and Co grew so unconvinced by Cook as alimited-overs batsman that he has not played a one-day internationalsince November 2008. If his batting at Durban and Cape Town was enoughto persuade the selectors he was ready to lead the Test side, then hehas long squandered the credit built up by the Rose Bowl ton. He is, inessence, starting all over again.

Leading man: Alastair Cook trudges off after losing his wicket

To recap briefly, Cook averages 30 as a one-day opener, which wouldnt be bad if he scored quickly. Yet if he repeats his strike-rate of 68 in the three-match series against Bangladesh, the onus will be on Kieswetter to keep things moving. The newcomer may need all the luck he can get.

There is an uneasy sense here that England are moving forward with one leg and back with the other. Because if Kieswetter possesses precisely the kind of high-octane game that could take the 2011 World Cup on the subcontinent by storm, Cook must prove he is more than a throwback necessitated by the captains armband.

The situation will be complicated still further when Andrew Strauss returns at which point Cook, an England captain no less, will presumably be dropped. Then there are Jonathan Trott and Joe Denly to think about. And Ian Bell, who like Strauss averages 33 as a one-day opener may believe he is still in with a chance too.

The Cook-Kieswetter alliance if that is what materialises could yet be the start of a new era. But if recent history is anything to go by, it will probably turn into another blip on a chart full of them.

Those 14 partnerships in detail: Englands opening batsmen since the 2007 World Cup...

BatsmenInningsRunsHighest partnershipAverage partnershipHighest individual scoreCook/Prior92787630.89102 CookPrior/Wright10006 PriorCook/Mustard1034215834.2083 MustardBell/Wright4934923.2546 BellBell/Cook1535353.0027 BellBell/Prior729810159.6073 BellBopara/Bell2807940.0060 BoparaBopara/Cook1333333.0024 BoparaStrauss/Bopara728910841.29105 StraussStrauss/Denly826810633.5063 StraussTrott/Strauss*21027451.0087 TrottStrauss/Wright1414141.0024 both

*Two innings divided by the Strauss/Wright partnership

FOLLOW THE TOP-SPIN ON TWITTERFor cricket-related snippets through the week, go to: twitter.com/the_topspinTHAT WAS THE WEEK THAT WAS

Brilliance: Hashim Amla

Glorious failure

You make 114 and 123 not out and your side still loses a Test match by an innings. Hats off to Hashim Amla, who creamed 490 runs in three innings during the 1-1 draw with India while being dismissed only once and has now made 660 runs in his last five Test knocks at an average of 220. And to think this was the bloke England kept trapping lbw.

Still, at least the South Africans now appreciate the effort involved in saving a game nine wickets down.

With Test crickets No 1 ranking at stake, Amla and last man Morne Morkel survived for 76 minutes and more than 20 overs as South Africa sought to preserve their series lead in Kolkata.

A karmic response to Centurion and Cape Town seemed on the cards, only for Harbhajan Singh to remove Morkel with minutes left on the clock. Shame on these two-Test series

With friends like that...

The fun doesnt stop once Bangladesh walk off the pitch. Oh no. Because their Australian coach Jamie Siddons plays as many shots behind the mic as his batsmen do out in the middle.

After the Bangladeshis had slumped to 88 for five on the fourth evening of the one-off Hamilton Test against New Zealand a game they went on to lose by 121 runs Siddons hedged his bets and suggested the collapse had been the result of ;terrible batting.

And he had a direct message for struggling middle-order batsman Mohammad Ashraful, a player who began his Test career nine years ago with a debut century in Colombo at the age of 17 but has struggled so badly since then that he currently averages 22 from 53 Tests.

Siddons verdict? ;He had a terrible tour and he kept making the same bad decisions. We might have to reassess Ashraful when we get back.

England may be hoping any decision is deferred.

Remember,to avoid being trapped without your personal edition of The Top Spin,sign up now to receive the column direct to your inbox by clicking here A strange sort of decline

If Australia are over the hill, the Top Spin will have some of what theyre having. This winter they have won Test series against Pakistan (3-0) and West Indies (2-0), as well as 50-over series (5-0 v Pakistan, 4-0 v West Indies), two Twenty20 matches and presumably the daily race to bag the best net facilities. Englands only hope in Ashes year is that the Aussies like New Zealands rugby players are peaking at just the wrong moment. You read it here first.

Dont mention the hurling

If this column was paid a pound for every mention of Eoin Morgans supposed background in hurling, we would be far away, laughing. The myth cropped up again while he was smashing an unbeaten 67 off 51 balls to help England win the first Twenty20 international against Pakistan in Dubai, but the Top Spin can exclusively reveal that Morgan is sick and tired of it. ;I played the sport for three years and havent played since I was 12, he recently confided. ;My cricket skills have got nothing to do with hurling. Let that be an end to it.

Hurly burly: Eoin Morgan"s focus is on cricket - and certainly not hurling

The ultimate all-rounder

It was great to see Stuart Broadsinclusion in a Beano cartoon with Roger the Dodger in aid of theexcellent Sport Relief project. But has he been working on skills weneed to be told about? In the first few illustrations, Broad usuallya southpaw is clearly batting right-handed, only to switch to hismore customary method later on. A simple mistake? Or has KevinPietersen been divulging his switch-hit secrets? Watch this space.

Arrogant? Moi?

Anyone who has followed the first two seasons of the Indian Premier League will know of the omnipresence of Shah Rukh Khan, the Bollywood star and owner of the Kolkata Knight Riders franchise who doubles up as a demi-god in his spare time. Khan is a charming man, though not without a sense of his own worth, as he showed in an interview with the Financial Times at the weekend.

Denying that the title of his new film, My Name is Khan, derived its inspiration from his own surname, he insisted: ;People think Im very arrogant, which Im not. Later, though, the mask slips when he considers the possibility of tackling ;weightier themes in his movies. ;Maybe when you reach a level of stardom and universal appeal that perhaps I have he begins, possibly adhering to the old dictum that if youre not going to big yourself up, nobody else will

Its a mans life

The news that Northamptonshires South African-born batsman/keeper Riki Wessels has been denied a work permit for the new season will strike some as a welcome blow against the legion of non-England qualified players in county cricket. But Wessels, who is currently playing domestic cricket in Zimbabwe, did not have long to go before he officially became English, and has now told friends he is considering a career in the Australian army. Those who recall his dad Keplers sergeant-major approach during his stint as coach at Wantage Road may not be entirely surprised.