ON ONE of the rare occasions Geoffrey Boycott was the victim, as opposed to the perpetrator, of a Test match run-out, he spent the rest of the day fuming on the balcony while his partner, Dennis Amiss, went on to score an unbeaten century. “It’s ma roons e’s scoring!” wailed Geoffrey. “Ma bloody roons!”

A more passionate man than Steve Harmison might have taken a similar view of Graham Onions’ Test wickets on Thursday, as he toiled all day at Hove without getting one while his Durham colleague was taking five against a West Indies batting line-up that was a walking invitation for a fast bowler to get his name etched on to the Lord’s honours board.

Harmison has been banished, possibly forever, to the two-man-and-a-dog county championship circuit, although the dog could have produced a vet’s certificate for Durham’s match at Hove and stayed at home on the grounds that it was far too cold to venture out. It was a long way from a Test match atmosphere, as Harmison, heavily sweatered, had plenty of time to reflect during his long stints down at fine leg, with no one for company bar an old boy in a deckchair reading the Brighton Argus and a couple of screeching seagulls.

If things go wrong for England at the start of this summer’s Ashes series we may yet see him again, but it’s unlikely he’ll be there for the opening Test in Cardiff to set the tone for the entire contest, as he has done in the previous two encounters. In 2005 his opening spell was so hostile that Australia’s top three batsmen all required medical assistance, and in 2006, he was once again unplayable, but only because not even The Don in his pomp could have made contact with an opening delivery going straight to second slip.

Harmison’s body language at Hove was pretty much the same as it’s always been. Whether he beat the outside edge, hit someone on the helmet (as he did Sussex’s Luke Wright) or sent down something far too wide to hit, it was the customary half a raised eyebrow, a tug on his shirt shoulder, and a plod back to his mark.

Harmison claims that he remains “desperate” to play for England, and when he was dropped in the West Indies this winter, sought out Andrew Strauss for a clear-the-air meeting. With a placid bloke like Harmison, this kind of thing would not have involved Strauss’s hotel bedroom door parting company with its hinges, and as Harmison says himself: “I’ve never been obsessed by cricket. If it all ends tomorrow, so be it.”

Maybe tomorrow is already here. Once, he was not only dangerous, but accurate with it, when bouncer and yorker were so equally threatening that a batsman didn’t know whether his next medical appointment would be with an ear, nose and throat specialist or a chiropodist.

He can get fired up, as he did when Boycott suggested last year that he was not worth his central contract. “The bloke’s a waste of space,” said Harmison. So there’s one possible solution. Boycs rarely misses a chance to inform England that his services are available, so if we can get him padded up and into the nets, Harmy may yet rediscover that killer instinct.

Harmison’s enigmatic performances since that heady summer of 2005 have produced more than one case of the England hierarchy telling him to go away and take some wickets for Durham. On this occasion, though, there is the suspicion that he’s been told just to go away. If there is indeed a licensed premises called the Last Chance Saloon, Harmison has become something of a regular, although this time, perhaps, the towels have been draped across the pump handles and the landlord has turned out the lights. At the very best, it’s last orders.

In fact, if we’re ever again going to raise a glass to Harmison, the saloon might be the way to go. On the night before Jeff Thomson was due to make his debut for Australia, Dennis Lillee spotted him in the hotel bar getting stuck into the triple vodkas. “Don’t you think that’s maybe not quite the ideal preparation?” inquired Lillee.

“No worries, mate” replied Tommo. “When I get a hangover I’m in such a bad mood I just want to go out there and kill a few people.”

So if Andy Flower is as astute as we hope he is, he’ll order Harmison off the county circuit and get him down to the pub.