India and England are stretching every sinew for the Pataudi Trophy in the five-Test series that kicked off in Birmingham yesterday. Or are they? At least it doesn't seem so, going by the negligible mention of the Trophy in the build-up to the contest. On Tuesday, rival captains Virat Kohli and Joe Root posed with the series sponsors' trophy but the Pataudi Trophy was not in the picture.

While sponsorship is critical to the health of the game and sponsors deserve every inch of mileage, it must never come at the cost of sentiment. Sure, it would have been odd to have the captains posing with both trophies. But it would probably be better to have an addition to the oddities rather than ignore the Pataudi Trophy; the other oddity being that England and India play for another trophy when the Test series is hosted by India — the Anthony de Mello Trophy.