England may be trying to turn a corner West Indies know only too well, and thoughts of Jimmy Anderson and Stuart Broad kicking their heels at home will take some shifting by their replacements, but the three-Test series that begins at the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium on Tuesday has a greater significance.
On Sunday evening, the newly minted Richards-Botham Trophy was unveiled by the two cricketing titans who made their first class Somerset debuts together in 1974, shared an apparently riotous flat in Taunton and have been like brothers ever since. Richards, 70 on Monday, remains in incredible physical nick, as if he could swagger out to the middle this week with gum in mouth and bat in hand ready to strike the fear of God into his opponents; Ian Botham, four years younger but fuller in figure and with the hobbling gait of an old bowler, would probably still back himself. When has he ever not?
