Marcus Trescothick's story is not a new one, but this week, after the grim detail that cricket had driven him to the edge of insanity was added to a canvas that previously had contained just broad brushstrokes, it is time to acknowledge that cricket is entering a more mature age.

This year Trescothick was joined by two other international players who admitted to suffering from a stress-related illness and the reaction from the cricket community to all three has been almost entirely sympathetic and supportive.

Time was when high-profile cricketers such as Trescothick, Lou Vincent, the New Zealand batsman, and Shaun Tait, the Australia fast bowler, would not have felt comfortable admitting to any form of mental illness. Woven into the fabric of cricket, and sport in general, was a macho thread that did not allow for such a perceived weakness. This, though, is sport played by superheroes, not human beings; how those from a distance might imagine it to be played rather than how it really is.

Maybe the stigma lingers a little. Maybe this was why Trescothick initially sought to explain away his return from India in 2006, when his problems started to surface, as some kind of mystery virus - an explanation so utterly ludicrous as to invite ridicule. Maybe this is why Tait has angrily reacted to the mention of the word “depression”. He considers himself to be suffering from fatigue and stress.

No doubt there are still some old-timers who shake their heads and tut-tut about the softness of the modern game and its participants. Those, however, who truly remember what it was like may recall times when they, too, trod perilously close to the line. Diagnostics and the better support systems on offer are light years away from what was available to previous generations, but that is not to say that problems did not exist. From my own era, if they were honest with themselves, Graham Thorpe and Phil Tufnell would surely admit that, at times, they were in no fit state to be batting and bowling in the backyard, never mind playing for England.

Perhaps there were others. If figures from the Office for National Statistics are to be believed, there certainly would have been. It reckons that one in six adults suffers from “significant” mental health issues at any one time, especially in the 25-44 age range. About 3 per cent of the population suffer from more serious forms of depression.

There are 400 or so professional cricketers in England. Most of them entered the game with dreams of glory. At some stage all will have blips in form or injuries to contend with and all will be finished in the prime of life just as contemporaries are climbing a career ladder. There are enough former sportsmen clowning around on reality television to know that the loss of limelight can be hard to come to terms with.

Shortly after I retired I heard of a county cricketer who had tried to commit suicide. I made contact and he agreed to talk but insisted on anonymity (another sign that cricket had yet to free itself from the stigma of mental illness). With his career at a second club in decline, a relationship that was on the rocks and nobody to turn to, he found himself in what he called a “big black hole”.

One day, he locked himself in his flat, filled the bath, slashed his wrists and waited for his maker. Only by an outrageous piece of good fortune - a team-mate arrived, smashed down the door and hauled him to safety - did he live to tell the tale.

Had the timely intervention not happened, he would have been one more number to add to a curious statistic - one that David Frith, the cricket historian, has written about at length in his ground-breaking book about cricketing suicides, Silence of the Heart.

Suicide, as the ultimate expression of mental illness, seems oddly linked to cricket above all other sports. Frith has documented more than a hundred such cases, yet he could not find a single instance of a golfer or tennis player who had taken his life and only a handful of footballers and boxers. I played against three players to my knowledge who did so: David Bairstow, the former Yorkshire wicketkeeper; Mark Saxelby, the former Nottinghamshire batsman; and Danny Kelleher, the former Kent bowler.

Peter Roebuck has suggested one of the reasons for this alarming statistic is that cricket attracts odd, melancholy types prone to black moods, depression and self-harm. This cannot be right, surely. More likely is that cricket, because of its nature, is itself responsible for those that it mangles either for a short period or permanently. It is a game of the long drawn-out wait, which gives the mind ample time to play its tricks. Batsmen face up to failure - a sort of death - every ball, so that they are often a particularly vulnerable breed. Luck, too (the pitch, umpiring decisions), can play a crueller role in cricket than other sports.

It is unsurprising in the past that so few have found the wherewithal to admit to these problems. Playing sport well is about suspending belief; you have to convince yourself that you are invincible for a while. Any sign of vulnerability is dangerous in a team game, where there is always somebody ready to take your place, and as an individual performer, given that so many battles on the cricket field are personal. Any sign of weakness will be seized upon.

For Trescothick, Vincent and Tait, the playing of cricket was the catalyst for their descent into mental illness. Trescothick could not handle the long periods away from home, the guilt, the knowing looks when he returned. Tait's problem was a combination of an inability to manage expectations, poor form and injuries to his shoulder, lower back, hamstring and elbow. Vincent's self-doubt gnawed away at him, so that he never truly felt comfortable with where he was and who he was.

Thankfully, all felt that some good would come of their going public. Certainly, Trescothick is trying to sell a book and Vincent wanted out of his New Zealand contract to sign for the Indian Cricket League, but all three have spoken honestly and movingly about the problems they faced and cricket has been mature enough to accept their illnesses for what they are. The only discordant note came from Geoffrey Boycott, who accused Tait of lack of character.

I would have thought that it would be easier to keep going in some kind of private hell, grinning to the world and playing up to the myth of invincibility that generations of sports writers encouraged, than to admit to their problems. Their speaking out is to be admired, especially since it may convince others in similar circumstances to do the same and to seek help before it is too late.

I inquired this week about the county cricketer who had tried to commit suicide. He moved abroad, is happily married and plays cricket recreationally.

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