KEY POINTS:
A tour of Australia is no place to be for someone suffering from depression. Actually, no cricket tour is a place for depression sufferers.
Depression is very different from disappointment or just feeling sad about things and we can thank John Kirwan for the fact that we better understand that this affliction can affect even people who have much to be thankful for.
But I feel there would be few environments outside of prison more suitable than a cricket tour for breeding this illness.
I'm not saying a tour is a dreadful affair by any means - it's just the combination of pressure and down time that a cricket tour provides that could bring on depression for those with the disposition.
On a modern cricket tour, there is a lot of down time during the course of a match but little once the pressure of the game is over.
It's interesting to see that Marcus Trescothick's first public indication of his illness came during an India tour.
On the subcontinent, you spend hours in your hotel room with little to do but watch television or contemplate your own cricketing existence.
Cricket is a game played in split seconds with too much time between those seconds for personal contemplation.
A piece of poor luck or poor judgment within the blink of an eye could see you mulling over your fate for hours, days, weeks and even a lifetime for some - and that can also be in times when the team is going well.
Trescothick is not a player prone to long runs of poor form. He's a quality player with a quite outstanding record.
But, if you've been around cricket for some time, it is easy to respond to success with a sense of relief and failure with unnerving self doubt.
Simply put, it's hard enough making your way in a game that is '90 per cent mental' when all is OK upstairs, let alone when things are not quite right.
I wish Trescothick - an opening batsman whom I've always held in the utmost admiration, the best in overcoming this illness and hope he returns to the international level.
Now, speaking of things mental, has anyone else noticed that in a game between Auckland and Northern Districts, last week Hamish Marshall made 170 not out?
Marshall can play, no doubt about that, and I don't buy into the theory that county cricket (where he also scored heavily for Gloucestershire) is of a rubbish standard. He's now doing something he's never done before - scoring big and often at the first class level - and that shows he has more understanding of his game.
Now, can he understand how to transfer that to the international level and how it's subtly different from when he first sprung on the scene three years ago.
