English cricket struggled for any level of cut-through last year. It was the Paris Olympics and the men's football European Championships that drew the attention of the casual sports fan and an underwhelming international summer of cricket fell flat: the abiding image was the backdrop of thousands of empty seats at Lord's when England wrapped up their series win over Sri Lanka. 

But the next six weeks will provide a rare chance to capture the imagination of the British public, against a relatively quiet set of rival events. India are in town for men's, women's, A team, age-group and Disability series, and after England swatted aside Zimbabwe's men and two underperforming West Indies teams, Friday's first Test at Headingley marks the start of the main event. 

"Last summer, there were all sorts of things happening all over the place, weren't there?" Gould says at Lord's. "I think that is one of the great things about a five-Test series: it is a proper long-read; it's something that people can get really into. There will be subplots, and sub-subplots. There will be all sorts of issues over that six-week period.

"India's men have not won in England since 2007, and three of their all-time greats - Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma and R Ashwin - have quit Test cricket in the last six months. But their off-field dominance of the global game is such that the ECB now considers a Test series against India on par with the Ashes. "Certainly, in terms of commercial importance," Gould says. Most tickets were sold before the end of last year, and Gould was buoyed by India's recent tour to Australia - their first five-Test series there since 1991-92.

"There's been lots of discussion about short formats, but Test cricket is doing quite a resurgence in its own way," he says. "Particularly with the five-Test series: we're seeing more of those than we have done for a long time." England's next two Test series - at home to India, then away in Australia - will be the sixth and seventh five-match series of the decade, after nine in the 2010s.

For the last 20 years, five-Test series have been the preserve of the Big Three, but for the 2027-31 Future Tours Programme, the ECB is exploring the viability of playing another opponent across five Tests. The most compelling candidates are South Africa, not least after their victory over Australia to win the World Test Championship.

England have not embraced the tournament as wholeheartedly as many of their opponents, but the freshly minted Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy will mark the start of a new cycle - though perhaps not a new attitude towards it. "The WTC, for us, is not the be-all and end-all," Gould says, speaking before last week's final, "because we also enjoy the Ashes and we will enjoy the India series. 

Pragmatically, financially, those are things that underpin the sport in England, and I don't see that changing. We're very fortunate in that we are able to contribute to the ICC model, but we also have a really strong game here in our domestic market.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan (INP)