THE England selectors have a decision to make by tomorrow morning that is no less difficult than the one faced by their Australia counterparts over Steve Waugh earlier this year. Should they stick with Alec Stewart, only the fourth Englishman to score 8,000 Test runs and still as good a wicketkeeper as any except, perhaps, the unavailable Jack Russell, or make the telephone call that consigns his career to history?

Meeting to pick the team for the first of the season’s seven npower Test matches, against Zimbabwe at Lord’s starting on Thursday, they have to weigh Stewart’s generally excellent performances throughout a winter when his fitness and professionalism suggested that his life is barely beginning at 40, against the opportunity to plan ahead.

If they stick with Stewart, he will be twice the age of his rival in the same all-round role for Zimbabwe. Stewart was 40 on April 8, Tatenda Taibu was 20 on Wednesday. Yet to drop him would be a fine example of ageism. Like Waugh, who may yet lose the Australia Test captaincy before he is ready to relinquish it, Stewart may be sacrificed to appease the clamour for youth.

If so, his replacement would probably be James Foster, possibly Chris Read, who will certainly be the choice to take his place for one-day internationals. For four solid reasons, however, Stewart’s retirement should come at the end of this international season, not the start.

The first is that he is the best in the business, still; the second that Zimbabwe should not be underestimated; the third that there is a possibility that Andrew Flintoff will not be fit to balance the team; the fourth that no one is absolutely sure that Foster is a better bet for Test cricket than Read, or indeed that either of them is superior to Andrew Pratt, or Luke Sutton, or Mark Wallace, or Matthew Prior, or Tim Ambrose, or David Nash . . .

The next wicketkeeper ought to be someone who is capable of making at least one hundred every 20 Tests: Stewart has made 15 from 126, better than one in ten. Only Adam Gilchrist, a genius, and Kumar Sangakkara, a better batsman than wicketkeeper, can match him. Mark Boucher scores one in 20, Ridley Jacobs one in 25.

It should be made clear to Stewart that in the interests of forward planning, this season’s Tests against Zimbabwe and South Africa will be his swansong. Then he could bow out to a proper fanfare in September. Starting in Bangladesh in October, England are scheduled to play 26 Tests before the next challenge from Australia in 2005. There is plenty of time to bed in Stewart’s successor without dumping him unceremoniously after a series against Australia in which he averaged 44.

The second difficult decision for the new panel is whether to retain either or both of Robert Key and John Crawley, the two uncontracted middle-order batsmen who were in residence at No 5 and No 6 respectively when England last played a Test match — beating Australia, lest it be forgotten, by 225 runs in Sydney in January.

If Flintoff recovers from a compressed nerve in his right shoulder, Crawley may be jettisoned while Key is retained. The Kent man showed glimpses in Australia, and later for the academy team in Sri Lanka (two centuries in three junior Tests), of the commanding Test player he may become. Because of Crawley’s inability to change gear in a Test innings, like Mark Ramprakash before him, the preference for Key would be legitimate.

That said, there is a general misconception that Crawley has been a failure. He actually averages 34, slightly better than Ian Botham, Mark Butcher and Graeme Hick and one run inferior to Mike Gatting, two to Allan Lamb. He will be 33 in 2005, quite possibly at his peak, and he played the best innings for England in that debacle of a first Test in Brisbane last October before suffering an injury even as he helped to save them from humiliation against Australia in Hobart.

There may be one other concession to youth. William Jefferson, at 23, has powerful advocates for his talent in Nasser Hussain and Graham Gooch, but has not scored sufficiently heavily this season to force a way in just yet. For this match he may be included in the preparations simply to introduce him to the Duncan Fletcher-Hussain regime. Ian Bell and Jim Troughton have already had a taste of that and Mark Wagh must also have come under consideration, but Jefferson’s reach and timing make him exceptional.

The bowling virtually picks itself now that national contracts permit full management of the regular England players from the centre. If Flintoff is fit, the five-man attack will be Caddick, Anderson, Flintoff and Giles, supplemented by either Harmison or Hoggard.

If, however, Flintoff does not recover, the selectors must either choose six specialist batsmen and only four bowlers, or give a chance to an alternative all-rounder. Darren Maddy is a batsman who bowls; Martin Bicknell, Alex Tudor and Richard Johnson all bowlers who bat. As so often, alas, neither of the last two is fully fit anyway. Robin Martin-Jenkins, an improving batsman, is a truer all-rounder but is deemed to lack sufficient pace for Test, as opposed to one-day, cricket. Rikki Clarke’s bowling is not yet ready, but he has exceptional talent, so the final choice may rest between Flintoff, Crawley and Jefferson.

POSSIBLE XIV: M E Trescothick, M P Vaughan, M A Butcher, N Hussain, R W T Key, A J Stewart, A Flintoff, J P Crawley, W I Jefferson, A F Giles, A R Caddick, M J Hoggard, J M Anderson, S J Harmison.