Before we condemn any England cricketers as cowards - and the plea comes too late to stop some commentators - it is worth listening to Graeme Le Saux. He cannot provide an insight into security in Mumbai or Mohali or tell Stephen Harmison what to do. His words may be lost on those who insist that England's cricketers have a duty to return to India whatever their circumstances.

But as a member of Chelsea's so-called “White Feather Six”, the former England full back is able to speak from experience about declining to board a plane with your team-mates. Condemned as yellow for staying at home, he spoke yesterday with empathy for the cricketers who have been agonising over their return to India after the massacre in Mumbai.

As captain of Chelsea, Le Saux faced a comparable decision in October 2001 when the club were required to fly to Tel Aviv for a Uefa Cup match. In what he described yesterday as “an humiliating experience”, Le Saux was one of six players who were required to raise their arms in the dressing-room at Stamford Bridge to indicate that they did not wish to travel.

“You are a team player and you feel terribly guilty about letting the side down,” he said. With no player wanting to jump first, the squad counted to three before he, Eidur Gudjohnsen, Albert Ferrer, Marcel Desailly, Emmanuel Petit and William Gallas held their arms aloft in unison.

Accusations of cowardice were quick to follow, just as they will be for any cricketers who decline to tour. David O'Leary, then manager of Leeds United, against whom Chelsea played their next fixture, fuelled the media-baiting. “Is Leeds a safe place to come?” he mocked.

That tone, echoed in some of the coverage of the England cricket team's wavering, was described by Le Saux yesterday as “juvenile and simplistic. We should be very careful who we call a coward.” Le Saux is as insistent now as he was seven years ago that it was the right decision not to join the trip to Israel. His newborn son was barely a week old. “Five out of the six who didn't go had either just had a child or were due one,” he said. “Your responsibility to your family is heightened.

“This was a world still in shock from 9/11. My wife rang the Foreign Office and they were advising against anyone travelling to Israel. British Airways weren't flying there at the time.”

The Israeli Minister for Tourism was killed by gunmen in Jerusalem on the day that Chelsea flew to Tel Aviv, but it was personal issues that, ultimately, were more decisive than security reports.

What was not known then, because Le Saux chose to keep it private, was that staying in his house were two friends, one heavily pregnant, who had been forced out of their flat in Manhattan by the collapse of the twin towers of the former World Trade Centre a month earlier. “They had witnessed the full horror of it,” he said.

He reveals it now only to make the point that before sweeping judgments are made about any of the cricketers, their critics should be sure of all the facts. The Chelsea players had been assured that there would be no repercussions for staying at home but, as Andrew Flintoff and any other waverers may want to consider, that did not prove the case. Ken Bates, the Chelsea chairman, quickly made it known that he felt let down by the stay-at-homes. Le Saux was singled out as ringleader.

“That was a disgrace,” Le Saux said. “If it was going to get personal, why give us the choice? The club had hoped that the whole thing would go away, but when it was clear that it wouldn't, they should have made the decision. No other teams travelled to Israel at that time and none of the players were happy about travelling. The team should never have gone.”

The toing-and-froing reached farcical levels when Chelsea sent in Ronny Rosenthal, the former Liverpool and Israel forward, to sell the delights of Tel Aviv to the players. “Ronny came in and started telling us about the lovely beaches and the great bars,” Le Saux said. “As if that was in any way relevant.”

Invited to exercise his own judgment and conscience, that is precisely what Le Saux did. And he has no regrets about his decision despite the criticism. “I didn't think anyone was going to go out and get killed in Tel Aviv, but that's nothing to do with it,” he said. “It's about your emotional state.

“It was a much harder decision for me not to go, the hardest decision I ever made in football, but who do I upset - the club and a few journalists or my family? That's what it came down to. I put my family ahead of my football. If any cricketers decide not to go for the same reasons, they will deserve respect not humiliation.”

Morrison's run earmarks him as future star

No one at Manchester United knows if Ravel Morrison is named after the French composer of Boléro. But they are certain that this young lad from the tough end of Moss Side is the most exciting teenager since a crop of youngsters called Scholes, Beckham, Butt and the Nevilles came through in the mid-Nineties.

Making his debut at Old Trafford last week in the FA Youth Cup, Morrison skipped past two Chelsea defenders and the goalkeeper - then doubled back and attempted to do it all again.

The opportunity was missed, the game eventually lost, but it is hard to believe Sir Alex Ferguson raged at the profligacy. Like the rest of us, he will have wondered when he last saw such balance and daring from an English 15-year-old. The answer is a long time ago.

No fuss about Webb

Howard Webb took charge of a game I was playing in once. As well as being the fittest man on the field (not hard given that it was two press teams), he was friendly without being too matey. The only one more accustomed to sharing a pitch with Steven Gerrard and Wayne Rooney, he happily stayed in the background.

As far as I could see, he brought all the same qualities to the Manchester derby, letting the game run and showing the yellow card only where necessary. Sir Alex Ferguson still had a whinge and some muppet still rang BBC's 606 to complain but, when it comes to our referees, Webb strikes me as the best of an ordinary bunch.