1: West Indies must pick up the pace

England cricket tours traditionally begin with a picnic match and a disaster. History is littered with unlikely heroes of President’s XIs from across the cricketing world: 17-year-old batsmen who make centuries against England’s finest, 45-year-old part-time bowlers who take six-for with their rarely seen leggies. Tomorrow, England start their tour to the West Indies with a three-day match in St Kitts, a place that should be able to provide more than the usual number of banana skins.

My hope for this game is to see the emergence of a 19-year-old bowler, getting on for 7ft, who bowls at close to 100mph, and what’s more, does so straight. I bear no ill will to the England batsmen, still less the new captain, Andrew Strauss, right, but I would love to see the emergence of a new terror from the Caribbean. Since the Eighties, West Indies’ decline has been painful for all save batsmen. Cricket needs a team from every continent but the Americas are dying on us. I long to see the balance redressed: for pace to set fire once again to the West Indian imagination.

2: Aching for Cup of cheer

This was the week that the football season gave up. Liverpool got an attack of vertigo and gave the Barclays Premier League lead to Manchester United; United are remarkable for clean sheets and stolen late goals; Arsenal have lost their best player; Chelsea have lost their way; Aston Villa are jolly worthy and Manchester City are fascinating for purely fiscal reasons. So now to the FA Cup fourth round this weekend, and a chance to huff some new life into the season. I don’t want upsets. I want excellence. I want great encounters. I want to see a team refind themselves. As teams give up in the Premier League and prepare to hand the title to United by default, perhaps the FA Cup can reignite the season.

Never mind the little clubs, I’d like to see a club of serious ambition refind their rhythm, their hope and their swagger. I don’t care which one it is: I’d like a stunning performance from, say, Arsenal, left, away to Cardiff City, or a glorious battle in the all-Premier League encounters between United and Tottenham Hotspur, or Liverpool and Everton. This season is due for a relaunch and it would be a fine thing if the Cup could provide it.

3: A bit of a fright could do Murray good

As the Australian Open rolls towards the end of the first week, we find ourselves caught on the horns of one of sport’s great dilemmas. Andy Murray, right, may have completed his third-round match against Jürgen Melzer by the time you are reading this. If we make the (by no means outrageous) assumption that Murray has got through, what should we wish for the others?

Either we can wish that a series of unfortunate injuries and dramatic loss of form affects the big names in the draw, moving to a three-love-sets victory for Murray against an easy opponent in the final — or we can will Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal to go through and take on Our Boy at the tournament’s climax.

In other words, we have to make up our minds where we stand on sport. Are we committed to partisanship or to excellence? Do we want a victory to cheer about or something beyond victory to treasure? I know, we’d like both if possible. But when it comes down to it, I’d prefer to be a raucous partisan for the nation of excellence.