The Nursery End | Rob Smyth

Duncan Fletcher and MS Dhoni face the press in Taunton. Photograph: Stu Forster/Getty Images

In the modern world dictionaries are almost redundant, with words meaning different things to different people. Yet rarely has there been such a disparity between two interpretations of the same word as there is for Duncan Fletcher. On the one hand, 'press' brings to mind the forward press, his groundbreaking batting technique; on the other it evokes the press, the men who gave him considerable agita as England coach and are now doing the same with India. When his side declined to chase 180 in 47 overs in Dominica, instead settling for a 1-0 series win, Fletcher had to answer accusations of negativity with the weary frustration of a parent trying to explain to a child for the 47th time that, no, you cannot put your hand in the oven. "I have covered it," said Fletcher. "I have been repeating myself the whole time. I have told you it was difficult to score runs." How things have changed: between 1986 and 2007, when India did not win a single series outside the subcontinent, their press would have lapped up such a win.

Fletcher would surely have enjoyed the partnership between Yorkshire's No10 and 11 – "never call them the tail", he says – against Worcestershire on Tuesday, with Ajmal Shahzad and Ryan Sidebottom adding 109 for the 10th wicket. The highest last-wicket stand in first-class cricket is 307, although the most striking on the list of the top 10 is the one between Ajay Sharma and Maninder Singh, who added 233 for Delhi's last wicket for against Mumbai in 1992. That's Maninder Singh, the rabbit's rabbit (or, as Fletcher might put it, the No11's No11) whose notoriously hopeless batting yielded a Test average of 3.80, the second lowest in history among those who have played 20 matches. In this match, however, Maninder made 78. He was in a rare run of form in first-class cricket, with scores of 41*, 28, 44*, 4, 56, 78, 8*, 3*, 66*, 31, 24, 2*, 15, 102*. That's 502 runs at an average of 72. Not quite Bradman-esque, then, but surely every erstwhile No11 enjoying a purple patch deserves to have it described as Maninder?esque.

This Thursday's Test between England and India will be the 2,000th in the history of Test cricket, the subtlest and greatest sporting format of them all. It's a game that takes time to breathe, so it's endearing and appropriate that it has taken 134 years to reach the 2,000 mark. That said, Test cricket has upped its strike rate: each block of 500 matches took 83 years, 24, 16 and 11. In fact, in the last six years there have been more Test matches than Twenty20 internationals, a status quo the world's governing body, the BCCI, will surely be delighted to preserve.

The ICC are pulling out all the stops to celebrate the 2,000th Test. They have, er, put the ICC Mace in the MCC Museum. The Mace has been held by India since they took over from South Africa as the world's No1 side in 2009. Crime-fighting organisations will be thrilled to know that replicas are not available for purchase.

Counties-in-aiding-England shock. Andrew Strauss was loaned to Somerset from Middlesex so that he could get some first-class cricket ahead of the Test series, and made 78 against India in the tour match on Friday. Strauss came up against his 2007 nemesis Zaheer Khan, with the result some inevitable Strauss-Kahn puns. As all journalists know, you should never let such trivialities as spelling get in the way of a decent pun. Or even a pun.

Even in this age of Gatorade and ice baths, it's not generally a shock to hear that a sportsman is fond of a popular pub-based form of invigoration. With such a private figure as Jonathan Trott, however, it was something of a surprise. In an interview with The Cricketer, Trott says: "I honestly don't think I'd be sitting here if I did still drink. I still have the occasional beer ... but, when it comes to nights out, you probably won't find me around. It can be quite tough but the guys in the team understand." It's probably a good thing he wasn't part of the team in 2005.

There has been much talk about Kevin Pietersen's diminishing returns for England, but perhaps his off-field influence is also dwindling. On Friday morning, Pietersen implored his 303,000 Twitter disciples to follow @jamesallan5. At midday on Friday, KP's friend had 22 followers. Twenty-four hours later, that had advanced to ... 27.

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