Arise, Sir Shane

The news that Shane Warne, Australia's wrist-spinning legend, is to retire from the game at the end of the current series will provoke extreme and opposite reactions; it will be celebrated by every fan of the sport wishing to see the little urn that holds the Ashes return to its spiritual home at Lords yet be mourned by every spectator who watches the sport simply to see a genuine magician at work.

I like most sports, cricket included, but I can not be accused of being passionate about it. I remember clearly, however, the day S Warne Esq. introduced himself to the world at large and changed my view of the game in white.

1993. Warne's first ever ball in Ashes cricket. Out strolls Mike Gatting, former England captain and, at the time, probably the best player of spin bowling in the country. The ball rips out of the back of Warne's hand, swerves and dips to pitch a foot outside Gatting's leg stump before tearing back in front of his hesitant forward prod and flicking the bail of his off stump. Unplayable, unbelievable and unprecedented. Not just the ball of the century, the best ball ever bowled in Test cricket.

In his next and penultimate test, Warne is poised to become the first man ever to take 700 wickets. That is almost double the number a certain Ian Botham took.

Yet like Botham, Warne is a flawed man. Capable of anything on the pitch, he has proven himself liable to the weakest moments off it. Affairs, sordid text messaging; the falls from grace have served only to highlight the heights he attained when clad all in white.

In short, it has made for great entertainment. The cricket world, nay the entire sporting world will be a little duller with his retirement. Let us celebrate a cricketing genius the likes of which none of us are ever likely to see again.