Matt Prior could yet come out of this match in credit. All he has to do is bat like Don Bradman. If that sounds a mite demanding, it’s because, as we stand, Prior is substantially in debt. He owes 105 runs. So if he gets a couple of hundreds, he’s ahead of the game; totally justified his selection as a batsman-wicketkeeper. I wish him luck.

He acquired this overdraft of 105 runs like this. He dropped Sachin Tendulkar on 20 and Tendulkar was out for 82; he dropped V. V. S. Laxman on 41 and Laxman made another ten; he also conceded 33 byes. You can argue that this was Michael Vaughan’s fault for not giving him a long-stop; you can argue that at least some of the byes should have gone into the book as wides. But that’s the way of it – byes are traditionally charged to the wicketkeeper. At one stage, Prior was keeping wicket to Laxman and Tendulkar together, a partnership between two great batsmen, both apparently in prime touch, and he had dropped them both. He must have been having a horrid time, but, as Peter Moores, the England head coach, was quick to point out, his body language was good. Keeping two, body language ten. That’s all right, then. He shouted a fair bit as well and did some good clapping.

So let me bend over backwards to be fair. It’s not Prior’s fault that India are a very good batting side. Nor is it his fault that this is a very good wicket to bat on. Nor is it his fault that England lost the toss. Prior is not to be blamed for dropping the Pataudi Trophy. He tried seriously hard, didn’t give up and the body language and the shouting were, indeed, things of beauty.

But the fact is, Prior is not a very good Test-match wicketkeeper to start with and he has had two days when he has slipped well below his best. So, to look at it logically, he has to bat and bat; show us what he is best at. Which is not keeping wicket. That’s not what he was picked for.

These days, the first requirement of a Test-match wicketkeeper is to bat effectively at No 7. The second requirement is to keep wicket. The logic is that the odd dropped catch, the odd bye, are less important than chunky fifties down the order. Alas, the logic is flawed: a wicketkeeper who drops two great batsmen in the same innings is a liability, while – bearing in mind that you need to take 20 wickets to win a Test match – a wicketkeeper who snaffles everything is a match-winner. Except he never gets written up as one. Nobody gets excited about a wicketkeeper who fails to make a mistake. Keeping is an undervalued skill. The parallel with football is obvious enough. The goalkeeper is the most lowly valued player on the pitch, and the most essential. It is generally accepted that Chelsea would have won the league last season had Petr Cech not been injured for much of it. Cech is supremely important to Chelsea; he cost them £7 million.

Roy Keane, the Sunderland manager, showed his considerable intelligence by splashing out a British transfer record for Craig Gordon – £9 million for a goalkeeper. This signing may be the difference between staying in the Barclays Premier League and relegation, and all the lovely lolly that is worth to a club. Keane has worked out that a great goalkeeper is not only the best signing a football club can make, it is also, and by a considerable margin, the best value.

But neither goalkeeping nor wicketkeeping is amenable to statistics. A goalkeeper doesn’t get goals and assists, while keeping wicket is the only frontline skill in cricket that doesn’t receive a column of numbers at every match. He can have five catches in an innings without making a headline; it’s not an interesting job. Just essential.

Both types of wicketkeeper are required to be people of contradictions. Both are required to be ultra safe, with miraculous powers of concentration; both are also expected to produce, as a matter of routine, match-winning moments of inspiration. Wicketkeepers are required to embrace this contradiction, not only without recognition from the public and the media, but without recognition from the people who run their sports.

The result is that goalkeepers trade for millions while strikers trade for tens of millions – how long before the first £100 million striker? – and that proper stumpers are out of fashion. This is a low-logic, high-risk policy and over the past two days it has been exposed. Don’t blame Prior, blame the fashion. And those who go along with it. Time for a Campaign for Real Wicketkeepers.