To think I once thought cricket dull. For more than 40 days and 40 nights, I have been gripped by the Ashes. I still couldn’t tell you where short third man ends and deep backward point begins, but I have fallen in love with the rollercoaster ride that Ben Stokes and his team have taken us on. So much so that I covertly watched every ball of the final hour of the final day while on a family outing to Come and Sing: Abba. I could stand the tension no longer when the ninth wicket fell so made my excuses and left to watch the final act outside with a beer in hand. After Stuart Broad secured a victory he and I will never forget, I returned to my seat in the grand concert hall at Snape Maltings and sang ‘The Winner Takes It All’ with added gusto.

Those who’ve followed every wicket on Test Match Special know there is nothing like live radio. Last week produced another reminder of the ear-twitching drama, the glorious unpredictability, the spine-tingling jeopardy which only it can produce. Andrew Malkinson, who spent 17 years in jail for a rape he didn’t commit, joined us in the Today studio on the morning after the Appeal Court’s decision to overturn his conviction. Justin Webb and I had told the audience that Andrew would be with us for the 8.10 a.m. slot normally reserved for political leaders and policymakers. At just before ten to eight my editor – and the unseen chief pilot of the programme – Owenna Griffiths told me in my headphones: ‘There’s no sign of him. The taxi’s waiting outside. His lawyer’s downstairs but he is nowhere to be seen.’ During Thought for the Day we agreed to drop the next item and to chat with our Moscow editor instead. We might need it to fill the looming hole in our running order. Ten past came and the star of the day (of the week… of the year?) was still not with us, although we were told he was on his way. Justin and a correspondent filled the gap while we all waited. There had, Justin initially told the audience, been a taxi problem. It wasn’t true, as he pointed out once Andrew took his seat at the microphone. Andrew had slept in – and who on earth could begrudge him that? Like many listening I expected to hear a wounded, angry and tortured man. Instead, he was gentle, dignified and thoughtful. As Andrew spoke of how he had survived the years of unjust incarceration and how he coped with the knowledge that all but a few people treated him as a sex offender, the editor dropped the next item. Andrew’s therapy dog wandered around the studio sniffing at every chair. Then came the news that left everyone listening open-mouthed. The prison service – the British state – would demand repayment for 17 years of board and lodgings. It was a moment few listening will forget.

Another moment came when I asked Nigel Farage whether his campaign for banking rights (I refuse to use that appalling word ‘debanking’) was fuelled by a desire to return to frontline politics, despite the fact he’d stood for election seven times and lost seven times. ‘I am sick to death of your condescending tone,’ came the reply. The response to this exchange was entirely predictable. Passionate Leavers heard what they listen to hear every day – evidence that the BBC still hasn’t ‘got over’ Brexit. Ardent Remainers raged that the BBC had once again given Farage the attention he craves. Both groups struggle to tell the difference between a legitimate question and a statement of opinion. As it happens, I think Farage has been one of the most influential politicians in my lifetime.

Farage is also a very accomplished broadcaster and, I suspect, believes he will be more potent (as well as considerably better off) if he campaigns from the studio rather than in parliament. The broadcast regulator Ofcom is now asking the public for their views on the rules that allow him and those who have been elected, like Jacob Rees-Mogg, to present their views in primetime on what is called a news channel. It is a debate that needs to take place. I have yet to meet anyone who wants Britain to have its own version of Fox News, which recently had to pay out more than £600 million for having been shown to knowingly broadcast lies about why Donald Trump lost the last presidential election.

Much has been said about the much-loved and much-missed George Alagiah. Perhaps there was not enough focus on how a boy from Sri Lanka who moved to Ghana could become the best of British broadcasting. That had a lot to do with the character of the man but it was also because he grew up, as so many around the world do, knowing the BBC values he came to embody. It has been a difficult few weeks for his colleagues at Broadcasting House. George’s greatest legacy would be if we remembered those values and why they still matter so much.