Onto smaller matters, that I know few people care about, but that are important nonetheless. Of the nine SuperSport series played this season, six have been drawn, including both over the past weekend. No wonder nobody, except dedicated parents and girlfriends, turn up at these 'exciting' encounters.

This weekend did have some decent action though. Stephen Cook broke the first class record by smashing 390 runs in a marathon, almost 14 hour-long, batting stint. There's also a cute stat in there for good measure: Stephen and Jimmy are the first father and son combination to have scored triple hundreds in first class cricket.

And therein lies the problem with the SuperSport Series. Why can't teams bowl each other out? Between Ntini, Lonwabo Tsotsobe and Johan Botha, they couldn't get Cook out. The Lions bowlers, Andre Nel, Friedel de Wet, Monty Panesar and Jonathan Vandiar, took two wickets each to bowl the Warriors out for 532. In one of the other domestic encounters this season, the Cobras scored 573 for eight against the Eagles, who replied with 527. Incidentally, the matches that have got results, have all been low scoring, compared to the ones that haven't.

I?d say Vincent Barnes has some work to do with the bowlers. Last week, Johan Botha scored a hundred. While I have no doubt that they will go a long way to establishing him as a genuine all-rounder, I can't see him repeating that feat against a Test attack.

On a happier note, the yawn fest that is the four day competition takes a break for a while and the MTN Domestic Competition starts this week. The tournament has changed format slightly and will only be 40 overs an innings now. That means less time to get bored? we hope. The Lions kick-start the event on Wednesday against an upbeat Cape Cobras side, who have recently returned from a successful Champions League. Perhaps they should try Alviro Petersen at number five, so we can see how that's going to work out as a replacement for Gibbs in the national side. Just a thought.