So says Joe Hussain, just back in London after watching the highs and lows of the England cricket team's performance in India under the captaincy of his son, Nasser.

The 61-year-old former works manager for the Chennai-based firm Mecotronics had flown down to India in December to watch the Bangalore Test. Then a nephew decided on a mammoth reception for Nasser in Chennai - and Joe had, yet again, to overcome his fear of flying and go down for the event.

"I wasn't planning on going out again," Joe told rediff.com "Then this nephew of mine who had arranged a big party for me became nervous and said, 'Uncle, you come out and introduce Nasser. So on Monday the 21st (of January) I got my ticket, on Tuesday I flew out there and I was there on the 23rd for the function."

Joe was delighted at the chance to see his son play in Chennai, on the same ground on which he had won his own cricket spurs many years earlier.

"The match was on the 25th and we had a terrific reception," says Joe. "I had a good place to watch from. Nasser got me 40 tickets for my relations. He came in to bat at number three, on the same ground where I played all my cricket. He batted for some time but the other chap was getting all the strike. Unfortunately, he then played a bad stroke and got caught in the deep."

Listen to Joe Hussain talk about his son, and it is clear that India has made a favorable impact on the England captain. Nasser has played cricket in India before, notably in the Nehru Cup one day tournaments in 1990 when he toured Hyderabad, Mumbai and Kolkata. But this has been his first Test experience of the country.

"From Mohali to Mumbai, his impressions of this tour have been fantastic," declares Joe. The experience of 500 to 600 persons at a time trying to get his autograph has been "compelling" and "overwhelming."

Adds Joe, "The only negative is the travelling, it's been hard. It's okay when you take the direct flights to Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata. But in a place like Cuttack, you have a five hour coach journey.

"One or two boys got this tummy bug, but most of them are happy. They can't really complain in India - the hotels are beautiful, the food is good. If they overdo something, it's their responsibility and they will pay for it.

"Some of those hotels are fantastic. I stayed in Jaipur at the Rambagh Palace, what a great hotel, and then the Sheraton in Chennai."

Nasser's positive reaction to India has done much to counter the impression back in the United Kingdom that he was trying to distance himself from his father's Indian roots. To be fair, this was never a perspective that Nasser himself encouraged, but it was certainly an angle propagated by the press and the publicity team of the England and Wales Cricket Board.

"No one in India has ever called him a traitor," says Joe. "They have taken him to their hearts and he loves the country. He has grown up in England, but he knows where I come from.

"I care very much for my Indian roots; my relatives are still there. Recently, Nasser was honoured at my club. They have been treating him as one of their own; they think Indian captain and England captain together.

"Whenever my nephew from India comes to London, we have a lunch or a dinner and I invite my other boys, including Nasser. Now when he was in Chennai he met all of them. That's when he told me, 'I'm putting names to faces.'"

Joe Hussain was born in Chennai, but describes himself as 70 per cent Chennai and 30 per cent Bangalorean because his mother comes from Karnataka. After completing his science degree at Loyola College in Chennai, Joe migrated to England in 1963 where he met and married his English wife.

Two years later, accompanied by his wife and oldest son, Mel, he was back in Chennai where he had a job as works manager for electrical components manufacturer Mecotronics. A second son, Abbas, followed by Nasser and daughter Benazir were all born in Chennai.

"We were a cricket mad family", recalls Joe. " I used to play for the Madras Cricket Club, I used to play all my cricket there.

"Nasser was only four or five years old, but both Mel -- short for Mehriyar -- and Abbas started playing there. Mel went into first class cricket in England, played for Hampshire for three years. Abbas just played Second XI cricket for Essex for a couple of years. But he was more of a chap who wanted to go into business."

When the Hussain family returned to England in 1975, Nasser focused on bowling and was a top class leg spinner by the time he was 13. "I know leg spin bowling and he was good", says Joe. "Then suddenly, when he was 14, he shot up six to nine inches in height and he lost his loop completely.

"I remember him crying in bed because the boys used to hammer his bowling," Joe reminisces. "So he started to concentrate on the batting. When he started to captain England at the Under-15 level, I knew he had something in him because he started scoring plenty of runs for them."

At Forest School in East London, where he spent his formative years, Nasser still holds the batting record for the highest number of runs scored in one season. After Forest, he did a science degree at Durham University and by 1990 he was playing as a full time professional cricketer for Essex.

"He was picked for England when he was 21", says his proud father. "He had been playing for Essex since the age of 18. But 1990 was the first full season he played, and he was picked to go with the England team to the West Indies under Graham Gooch's captaincy.

"He had a hitch for two or three years, he was injured and did not get picked for England. It so happens when India was here last, he got called back to Trent Bridge and scored a hundred there and has not looked back since then.

"This is his third year as captain. It's the biggest honour possible."

Joe believes that when his son hangs up his boots, some other attractive avenue will open up. "When one door closes, ten others will open to you," he says with a smile. "I can't go into details, but so many offers have come from media and television, he is just weighing it all up. He's getting a little bit tired of traveling, he is away six to eight months in a year, and it is harder now that he has had a son, the boy is six months old and he's hardly seen his dad."

Joe, meanwhile, has for 11 years now been running an indoor cricket school at Bee Hive Lane in Essex - and James Foster, England's wicket-keeper, is one of its alumni.