LAST Friday I was privileged to be able to attend the annual Cricket Writers' dinner in London.

It was a convivial affair with a great number of current cricketing luminaries present but, for me, the most illuminating part of the evening was the opportunity to sit next to Nasser Hussain and chat at length for the first time since our Combined Universities' days back in the late 80s.

Much has happened since then but there was still enough familiarity for the former England skipper to greet me with 'So how's it going, cripple?'

He wasn't looking so sprightly either mind, nursing a broken toe which he was still denying was sustained in a fit of pique after being dismissed by the most occasional of leg spin from Jacques Rudolph.

I wanted to ask him about his hundred against Glamorgan at Chelmsford just after he had resigned the England captaincy.

I was commentating on radio that night and felt that Alex Wharf had unnecessarily riled him with some choice words, precipitating a ferocious onslaught of cover drives and cuts from the Essex batsman. He agreed wholeheartedly, saying 'I didn't really want to be there at the start but 'Wharfy' got me going.'

We laughed about the imperfections in our batting techniques, especially a shared dislike of facing left arm seamers who swing the ball in late and of the difficulties of the prospect of life without playing cricket. 'I spend every waking minute thinking about cricket,' he told me while explaining that he had no idea when he thought he would finish nor of what he would do when it does end.

I think England will do well to win without him this week. Suddenly they look a disjointed, unstable side. Injuries have played their part but so has the form of some of the more senior players.

Captain Michael Vaughan is the one who worries me most. I just hope that the extra pressure of leadership is not affecting him. I worried about that when he was appointed and nothing since has eased my worry.

Vaughan did score 90 in a National League match against Surrey this week but, judging by his comments after the last Test, he would have only considered that 'soft'.

To me, he seemed to be having a go at certain individuals who have been introduced to the side lately. Some of those will still be around this week, like Ed Smith, Kabir Ali and Martin Bicknell. I wonder what the atmosphere will be like.

Alec Stewart will say an emotional farewell to English cricket fans on his home ground but one scathing newspaper article last week suggested that he should not be playing, headlining the piece 'National disgrace.'

It is true that his form has dipped, seemingly since he received a bang above the eye while keeping to Ashley Giles at Lord's but I am not sure that making a change now would bear immediate fruit.

I thought that Chris Read should have played in this series after his most impressive one day efforts but once the decision was made to go with Stewart, it always had to be for the whole series.

Having said that, very few professional sportsmen receive the send off at the end of their careers which they crave. Often the emotion of the occasion is too much for them - even for the incomparable Don Bradman who ended with a nought - but let us hope that Stewart can buck this trend and provide us with a fitting finale.

After all, he did show a sense of occasion in 2000 when he scored a century against the West Indies at Old Trafford. That was his 100th test cap, a milestone shared by Mike Atherton amidst much pomp and ceremony. Atherton hated it while Stewart revelled in it. So the omen is that Atherton would not admit before hand that it was his final game at the Oval two years ago and failed, while Stewart is not afraid of making a fuss about it this week. So hopefully he will succeed.

And there will be a Glamorgan presence there to cheer him on. As the county have no first class game this week, Mike Powell and Dean Cosker have been asked to go up to the Oval to serve as reserve fielders, just as they did last summer against Sri Lanka at Old Trafford.

And in case you didn't know, Powell took a catch, a decisive catch no less, which was the final Sri Lankan wicket. He has proudly let most people know this, so I'll be surprised if you have not heard.