Greetings from sunny Perth!

It seems ridiculous that I’m only three weeks away from coming back to England – and a very wet, cold and miserable England, by the sounds of things.

It seems so bad, I felt inspired to change my flight and delay it to give myself an extra day and a half soaking up the sun!

My regime has been pretty much the same every week with regards to my fitness programme and training – until this week when I managed to tweak my back squatting heavily in the gym.

It’s quite frustrating as I didn’t train for a few days and I have been pretty niggle-free since arriving.

With regards to my on-field form, I have been bowling as well as I could ask for, having won the four club games I have played in so far.

This week we came up against top-of-the-table Melville and as we sit in second place, it was a crucial game for my club, Willetton Melville’s top four have first-class experience, including Ben Brown, who is a wicketkeeper-batsman for Sussex, so it looked a tough test on a flat deck – or so we thought.

We rolled them for 103 and found ourselves 92-7 in reply!

It wasn’t even a dodgy pitch, just good bowling and a bit of ill-disciplined batting on our part. I got through ten overs and picked up four wickets. Although happy with that, it would have been nice if our batsman had allowed me to get my feet up and chill out.

This Saturday the game resumes and it’s finely balanced, even though we should score the remaining 12 runs, it won’t be that easy. A couple of lusty blows from me should do it – village style!

It was nice to see a familiar face from home in the form of Simon Tremlin, the head groundsman at the Wormsley ground in Stokenchurch and an Aston Rowant stalwart.

He is over here on holiday and managed to locate where I was, watching the game for an hour. As impressed as I was that he had found the correct ground, it was more amazing that he didn’t have a beer the whole time he was there!

He’s taking his marathon training seriously.

And finally to all my (millions, no doubt) loyal female readers and admirers, please remember to send your Valentine’s cards to my Australia address, not Leeds!

The big news this week has been KP’s sacking as an England player.

It remains to be seen whether it’s a wise decision. In the short term, England may suffer, as they have lost a few senior players recently. But going forward and certainly in the long term, it should be good news.

Although he is a class apart as a player and one of the modern greats, he has obviously created enough issues within the team environment to get to this stage. It’s a shame, as he still has a lot to give as a player, but it’s a team game and nobody is bigger than the game.

I know Alastair Cook pretty well and he is the most grounded and focused guy I’ve come across in cricket.

So he would have my full backing if he has had anything to do with the decision. The real loss will be felt by the England fans who love watching KP at his brutal best, but he has left them with fond memories.