Inside Cricket truly is your title for the most entertaining, informative, humorous and thought provoking analysis of the world's best sport this summer. See what's inside this month.

Will he, won’t he?

An issue that’s fizzing as furiously as the spin king’s wrong-un.

January 2007 was the last time Shane Warne appeared as the cover star on Inside Cricket. At that time, he’d just taken his 700th Test wicket and we ran the cover line, ‘Bowled Shane! 700…Ripping his way into history’.

Warne is back on the cover of our November 2008 issue. This time it’s not about any landmarks achieved on the field, but rather the debate about whether he’ll make a return to Test cricket amid Australia’s lack of quality spin options. Our experts were quickly on the case with this one, namely Ian Chappell who in his exclusive column discusses the merits of bringing Warne out of retirement, why he’d still be good enough, and the knock-on effect of such a momentous occurrence. Chappell also looks at what would happen if he doesn’t come back, and the options a desperate Australia should consider. We also look in further detail through a separate feature by Matt Cleary, who with spin guru and Warne mentor Terry Jenner analyses whether developing bowling-capable batsmen could work. Chappell’s analysis can be found on page 30, while our spin option piece starts on page 40.

In this issue we also feature David Hussey, who is one of those bowling-capable batsman knocking on the door of national selection. The younger brother of Mike, ‘Little Mr Cricket’ is a brilliant, hard-charging batsman who has already tasted life as an Australian player in the one-day side. How long until he dons the Baggy Green? You will have seen Adam Gilchrist’s name on the cover too, and that’s because we caught up with him and several others to discuss some of their most memorable sixes, and you’ll fi nd our feature, ‘Maximising the Maximums’, on page 48.

We also felt it necessary to bid a proper farewell to Sourav Ganguly after the Indian’s retirement last month. A man who split opinion amongst his peers and followers, there is little doubt he did a lot for Indian cricket.

I actually have a personal story about Ganguly and forgive me if you will for this brief piece of self indulgence. It was in the summer of 1991-92 back home in Adelaide when I was a youngster watching wide-eyed at the international players training in the nets at Adelaide Oval during a ODI between India and Australia. On his way to the nets for his own batting practice, Ganguly somehow spotted me and my mate Daryl amongst the sea of people and asked if we would like to bowl to him.

It was a surreal experience – bowling to an international cricketer on a turf wicket at one of the world’s great cricket grounds (even though it was the nets). Ganguly eventually asked if we would throw the ball at him as our express pace wasn’t exactly ‘express’ to him, but I remember him to be a very friendly character. I won’t ever forget that day, and I wish him well in retirement.

Enjoy this month’s issue, and don’t forget to send in your best photos for our Waeco Fans with Cameras section to insidecricket@acpmagazines.com.au

INSIDE CRICKET - OUT NOW