Lions mystery will be revealed today

The most fascinating thing about any Lions tour is that they simply don’t know if they’re any good or not. Nor do we. And nor do the opposition. That all changes within about five minutes of the start of the first real match of the tour, between the British Isles and the home team.

We have been through the formalities of the early tour. South African rugby has thrown up various confusingly different kinds of opposition: the serious contenders, the very nearly good, the frankly rather poor and the “who cares if we’re good or not, let’s just beat the crap out of them”. And the Lions have stood up to it all.

Sometimes they have done so with strength and promise, sometimes by means of luck and the skin of their teeth. They have shown hints of style and class and meat and resolve. They have been cautiously but thoroughly investigated, but still they haven’t actually been put to the test.

The rest of the tour can be gauged from the first fraught encounters of today’s match. The Lions may be unbeatable, or they may fold at the first hint of organised opposition. We just don’t know, because by definition the Lions have no history. Hold your breath and savour what will be.

Why I’m bowled over by Twenty20

I retain the right to withdraw these words at any time, but I love Twenty20. I have become a convert over the past couple of weeks. And it’s the bowling that has enthralled me — the genuine cricketing skills of a bowler, the odds against him more than ever, seeking to outdo the ancient enemy.

I thought the World Twenty20 would be all sixes and adverts, but the balance between bat and ball — the crucial aspect of cricket — has been more or less exactly right in this competition. The brilliance of the bowlers, in particular the spinners, has forced the batsmen into thrilling innovations.

The matter of bat and ball has always been an arms race as much as a straight contest in cricket. And instead of a hitting fest, we have had a competition that has been enthralling for cricketing reasons rather than for cheap thrills. The competition ends at Lord’s tomorrow, with the women and the men playing their finals one after the other, and that’s an innovation to cheer for in itself. It’s a dizzying change to start praising sporting administrators, but this is a tournament that they have got right. The finale is set up just as we would wish.

Button’s odyssey is a thrilling masterpiece

Jenson Button has become my role model. I can’t get enough of him. Late in his sporting life, after years during which everybody said he was one of those “good, but not quite good enough” sort of chaps, he has come up with his masterpiece.

It’s as if I, after years of merely writing the best sports columns I possibly could, suddenly produced a book as good as Ulysses. Button has struck his season and his sport like a thunderbolt from a clear sky and all those who have ever expressed an opinion about Button and his place in sport must spend the rest of the season wiping a six-egg omelette from their faces.

From mediocrity into triumph, a transition we all long to make. Button has chosen the only sport in which such a thing is possible because no driver, however brilliant, can win a car race without a fast car. True, great opportunities are there to be blown, but Button has shown no sign of blowing just yet. He rides out in the British Grand Prix at Silverstone tomorrow afternoon, doing it for every one of us who had to settle for less. Cometh the car, cometh the man.