Yesterday I asked why, ten days since the confidentiality agreement expired, the ECB had yet to explain why they fired Kevin Pietersen.
Make that eleven days now. But there’s been a development, of sorts: our Dear Leader has granted an interview to BBC Sport. This is the first time that a representative of the board has spoken since the gagging clause expired.
As long ago as 1st April, Alastair “Cooky” Cook seemed keen to unburden himself about the sacking:
I can’t actually answer that question totally at this precise moment in time, which is incredibly frustrating for me. Everyone will say I’m sitting on the fence but there are a number of reasons which will become clearer soon.It was a tough decision and the decisions will be made clearer in due course, and you just have to respect that at the moment. It is frustrating.
Today was Cook’s chance to drawn on all his famous inner steel and set the record straight. But he didn’t. On the crucial questions, not a word. Why?
Here’s what he did say. On the Flower era:
I am incredibly proud to have contributed in that period. To play under Andrew Strauss, to have played under Andy Flower as coach, I have only got respect for these guys. I do believe that era has been tarnished, and I am sad about that.
I have known Andy since the Essex dressing room, when he took me under his wing as a player. Obviously, your relationship changes as a head coach and captain and I only have respect for him as a man, and as a coach.
He was an amazing coach for our side. Chatting to some of the guys about it, they feel the same. A lot of the success was down to his drive and determination to make us a tough England side.
Well there’s one in the eye for those who claim an Essex mafia runs English cricket.
In fairness, you can see why Cook feels achievements have been tarnished. And he’s perfectly entitled to stick up for his mentor Flower. But “chatting to some of the guys” sounds a little suspicious. Was this an orchestrated line, a show of numbers?
On Pietersen’s claims of a bullying culture:
International cricket is a tough place and as a team you are striving for excellence at all times. Certainly at some stages those frustrations probably boiled over more than they should have done, but that was only people desperate to succeed and wanting to know the other 10 blokes around them were committed 100 per cent to them.
Did it over step the mark a couple of times? Possibly, but we addressed those issues — this always happens in teams. It certainly wasn’t a ‘bullying environment’ as such at all in my eyes.
As the captain over the last couple of years, I have tried to make it as successful as I can for the young players coming in and to make them feel comfortable.
More questions need to be asked. The line between tough professionalism and bullying depends on perspective. Cook remains close to Swann, one of those principally accused by Pietersen. It might have looked different from the point of view of players such as Trott, Panesar, Compton or Carberry. When was the mark over-stepped, and how was it addressed?
On Pietersen’s criticisms of Matt Prior:
That was probably the biggest shock for me. Matty is a great man who has been a fantastic servant for English cricket.
Hopefully if he can get through his really nasty injury – and who knows about that – we could see him again in an England shirt. He has to be remembered as a guy who put his heart and soul on the line for England all the time, and the team was all that mattered to him.
I’ve got some bad news for you, Cooky. Prior is never going to play for England again. Let him go. Make your own dressing room speeches. As Giles Clarke would say, “move on”.
In many senses it was deeply unfair for the ECB to hang Cook out to dry. Where the hell are Giles Clarke and Paul Downton? Why are they hiding behind a player – and one unable to answer many of the key questions? Why can’t they front up? I doubt Clarke would keep Lalit Modi waiting so long.
But Cook is the captain. He has led the side for two years and has personal equity in the big decisions, including the extermination of Pietersen. He promised answers. It was his duty to say more.
To what extent was Cook offering his own opinions, as opposed to the ECB corporate view? Was he briefed by Downton? Was he told what to say – and if so, how much latitude was he given? Was this a Lord’s press release in disguise?
Cook’s most significant line was this:
It’s been a really sad week for cricket. After talking to quite a few of my team-mates on the England team, we have to draw a line under it at some stage and this is a good time to do that.
Another reference to the other players backing him up. And compare his sentiments with Andrew Strauss’s comments on Thursday:
A lot of this that’s going on is madness. There’s been a lot of rumour, innuendo and opinion. I prefer to stick with the facts. All this tit-for-tat stuff, I don’t think really helps the England cricket team.
Andy Flower is a guy of complete integrity. If you look at [his] record as coach, it’s second to none. He’s achieved phenomenal things, and rightly should be regarded as one of England’s great coaches.
The victim here really isn’t Kevin Pietersen, or Flower or [Matt] Prior or anyone; it’s actually the England cricket team and Alastair Cook and Peter Moores, who’ve got to try to take the side forward. That, to me, is the disappointing thing about this whole episode.
Let’s put aside for now the idea that analysing past events will affect the team of today. How exactly would the form of Gary Ballance, Jos Buttler or Moeen Ali be influenced by this week’s events?
The point is that both Strauss (a free agent, but with strong establishment links) and Cook adopt a very similar tone. Is there an agreed line? Is this the ECB tactic?
Their joint message is this. Will the crowd please disperse. There is nothing to see here. Move along now. Draw a line.
Cook and Strauss are scaremongering. It’s almost a threat: keep talking about this, and you’ll harm poor old Mooresy. You’ll lose us the Ashes.
Next thing, they’ll cite health and safety.
The ECB are taking shelter behind Pietersen’s personal diatribes and ignoring the real questions the affair exposes.
Has there been bullying? Why do the ECB leak against their own employees? Did Flower spy on his own players?
Was KP Genius properly investigated? Has there been vastly unequal treatment? Did an injured Prior retain his place because Cook can’t cope alone?
Why was Pietersen removed as captain? Why has there been no post mortem into the Australian whitewash? Why was Pietersen sacked?
Answer these questions, find out what happened and fix the problems? Or better to sweep everything under the carpet, pretend none of this took place, and keep on making the same mistakes?
This is a unique opportunity for the ECB. They will never have a better chance for truth and reconciliation; a better chance to reconnect with their public and build a new, more transparent, cricketing culture. But faced with the prospect of honesty and clarity, they’ve chosen to suppress and conceal.
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On a different note, we’d like to thank everyone for your comments and contributions over the tumultuous last few days. Our posts are only the starting point: the real work starts when you begin the debate. We appreciate your time and thoughtfulness, and are sorry we don’t have time to respond to every comment. It looks as if quite a few of you are new to The Full Toss. A warm welcome, and thanks for visiting.
I wonder if anyone has asked Kerrigan, Woakes, Compton, Carberry, Jordan, Bairstow, Finn, Smith, Hales, Taylor etc for their views on the dressing room culture and Cook’s supportive brand of captaincy.
In my view, the delay was essentially the time required for them to all get their story straight, or for the story to be distributed – I don’t pretend to know whether this is some kind of top down thing or a collective consensus on the largest, and seemingly most /floatational/ piece of wreckage to cling to.
But that took time, and there was some trial balloon work done, and so forth and so on, and I too noticed Bob Willis laying out the Line in the interval in the India / West Indies thing. [0]
[0] Do not get me started on the subject of Marlon Samuels.
Cook needed at least a week to memorise and practice this latest script without cocking it right up like he usually does.
They
They are circling the wagons. Look at the first 3 articles on cricinfo. And the comments under them.
This is war.
I just went to cricinfo and wasn’t able to see what you meant as I got the mobile site, but they did have this poll:
Poll: Has the fallout from KP’s book changed your view on the whole epiosde?
• Was on the side of sacking him, but not anymore
•Thought he should have been kept, but ECB were right after all
•I’m just bored of the whole thing
A fairly one sided set of options there!
“A lot of the success was down to his [Flower’s] drive and determination to make us a tough England side”.
How about some of the failure?
Was an unprecedented 3-0 defeat to Pakistan down to Flower’s “drive and determination”?
Was losing 2-0 at home to SA? (Only 149 by somebody-or-other in the drawn game preventing a probable whitewash)
Was drawing 0-0 in New Zealand?
And the big one – how about not only losing but being absolutely humiliated 5-0 and the squad disintegrating in Australia?
Or is the coach only to praise for the good times but not to blame for the bad times?
Maxie, the recent outpourings from The Full Toss have been better-written and better-presented than anything I’ve read or heard from the ‘established’ media – sorry to have to resort to that toxic word – but your latest Blog leaves me thinking: OK, I agree with that point, and that point, and that point – but where’s your remedy? You bow to realism by accepting that KP will never wear play for England again, and you’re pretty harsh on Prior too. Agreed. You make a convincing case for sacking Cook – as both captain of both the Test and ODI team. Agreed. (I’d sack him as an opening batsman in both formats, too – not so much for his recent record, but because his flaky technique has been exposed by all-comers.) If I read you correctly, you’d get rid of Clark, Downton and Moores as well. I guess we could all live with that, but who would you put in their place? Yes, there’s a World Cup coming up, but if England reach the semi-finals they’ll have punched above their weight. We don’t care about ODIs in the way that we cherish Test cricket, and all it stands for. So what we’re all more concerned about is next summer’s Ashes series. The coaching of the team has been dismembered already: Gooch, Giles and various bowling and fielding coaches have been unceremoniously dumped. On the playing side, you’d never have Prior back – and they wouldn’t dare pick him now, so that’s a given – and as well as ditching Cook I assume you’d dump Robson too. The possible replacements at the top of the order (Compton, Lyth, Lees, VInce) are either yesterday’s news or not ready for the challenge. On the bowling side, Finn is not yet fit for purpose; Broad is on crutches; Jordan and Woakes won’t cut it in the heat of an Ashes summer; Bresnan and Tremlett have been ditched etc. Spin-bowling? We all know that the Aussies will target Moheen and that Monty is not the bowler he once might have been. So, amidst your perfectly reasonable fulminations about what’s been going on, do you have a remedy? At management level, who replaces Clark, Downton, Moores and Whitaker? At the playing level, who’s your pick to captain the two sides? – please don’t suggest Bell for either role – and who are you proposing to bring in to a) open the batting b) provide back-up to Anderson and Broad, should either break down, and be your third seamer if they don’t, and 4) look after overs 60-80 on a flat track, and bowl them out on a bunsen? For every proposed sacking, from Clark’s cocktail parties to the boot room, you need to propose a replacement. Who might these individuals be?
From your line of questioning, it doesn’t seem like you’ve agreed with many of the points made on the blog at all. You sound like a TINA advocate for the whole set up!
” Yes, there’s a World Cup coming up, but if England reach the semi-finals they’ll have punched above their weight. ”
Really?
England can lose everyone of their group games against the top international teams in their group and still reach the quarter final. So they only have to win one match in the quarter final to reach the semi final. ONE MATCH in a whole World Cup, and they will be punching above their weight?
Yes, Mark, a semi-final berth would be a bonus for this team. If the No 9 seed at Wimbledon reaches the last four, that’s a result! But even if they somehow reach that stage and even win the World Cup itself (500/1 anyone?) the tournament will be forgotten within a month or two, I agree that the present set-up has failed us. I’d just feel more secure if there was a coherent Plan B in place, and I haven’t seen much blue-sky thinking amidst the carnage of the last week. Yep, KP is gone, Prior is gone, Cook is not long for this world etc, but time is running out! 1,000 words from Maxie, please, on how we intend to wrest the urn back from Mitch et al.
Frank,
It isn’t up to us to propose alternatives re admin. That is a ridiculous pretext from which to start. If I caught a top employee with his hands in the till, do I have to worry about who I get to replace him when he’s committed gross misconduct? Of course not. You get rid of them and do the best you can. Indeed, the ECB have a new man in to replace the bloke who kept his job despite, supposedly, being the main man behind the Stanford debacle.
What we have here are people patently, on performance, not up to the job of running English cricket. A trained lawyer, ignoring a confidentiality agreement. A coach, gone, but still at the ECB, with serious questions to answer. A Chairman with absolutely no common touch, alienating his constituents one by one.
Because I don’t know who will replace them doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be gone.
As for the playing staff, we are where we are. I’m not sure any of us can think of many better to play tests, we can think of better ODI openers. It’s too late to try now, in many eyes.
What I have is opinions on how the game is run. If the ECB had said sorry about the “outside cricket” comment, I think a lot of the fire would have gone out. Who knows?
It’s not up to us to suggest replacements, but if people don’t then invariably we are left with arguments for TINA. It may not be the way it should be but that’s what would happen. So even despite my limitations I’m willing to have a stab at it. A new coach? Easy, pick whoever has impressed the most in County cricket. Personally I’d go for Gillespie or Collingwood, but would be willing to defer to those who know the first class scene better. As for Clarke and downton, there are plenty of better managers, administrators out there. Someone with more public sector management, and political experience I would say. In either post men with a bit more skill at engaging with the general public than someone from the city is needed.
Good post Dmitri. I do really think that those in charge of the ECB really are the pits. Couldn’t organise the proverbial booze up at a brewery. I agree with your assessment wholeheartedly. IMO – not humble in my case! – is that they should all fall on their collective sword and real cricketing people brought in to get England Cricket out the mess it is in. These people just cannot run a train on the track and must go. There are plenty of really good committed people in cricket who could take over and make a real difference in every department.
Have you seen Harmison’s piece? Just so good. Really balanced – tipped off by Vian – and shows the faults on both sides but some very interesting snippets such as Broad being scared “s…less” when Flower’s name came up on his phone. Really scared of Flower. Worth a read. http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/sport/cricket/steve-harmison-fear-english-cricket-7921279
“At management level, who replaces Clark, Downton, Moores and Whitaker?”
If a doctor is guilty of malpractice, I don’t have to have a replacement in mind before I suggest he’s struck off.
I don’t think any of us have a great knowledge of prospective cricket administrators, but as the ‘impressive’ Downton was plucked from JP Morgan, why don’t we just let Billy Forrester have a crack at it? ;)
Frank – are you the chap who used to work for the BBC (and Sky, too, if I remember correctly).
If so, do you remember how I saved you from drowning in Durban all those years ago?
Well, more accurately, myself and Paul Jarvis shouted “help, help” and the lifeguard came and fished you. :-)
Yes, I cannot deny this. Thank you for saving my life!
This sounds like a job for Holly Willoughby…
“Frank…that was the last time you saw John, and you never thought you’d see him again. But now we’ve tracked him down, and he’s flown all the way from Wapping to be here tonight on The Full Toss…Surprise Surprise!”
Oh how wonderful. Brill story. Made me smile today.
Chris Read checks a whole lot of boxes as guy you put in there for a year or so to just settle stuff down. Good captaincy and wicketkeeping are what is required right now, and you buy a year or so to figure out a longer term answer. This is /exactly/ the time for some kind of more outside the nonsense near-the-end-of-the career guy, you give a remit, and nobody can threaten him because he knows he’s probably done in a couple years anyway.
Gillespie coach. Root captain. Admin people with equal talent, experience and record of success in their own field. Whoever their family are.
I’d like to see Colin Graves (Yorks Chairman) replace Giles Clarke, for a start.
Completely agree with Pontiac about Chris Read, and while he’s captain they should be actively testing and training several FECs, not just pinning the badge on one whose face fits. Whoever shows the most actual talent for captaincy under pressure should get the job.
Welcome to the TFT boards, Frank, and thanks for your comments.
I don’t think that we’ve been particularly rabid about Prior. My view was that once he’d lost his place after the Perth test, he hadn’t done enough in early season county cricket to make an unanswerable case for reselection – especially he had various injury problems. Hindsight bore that out.
I have indeed argued here that Giles Clarke and Paul Downton should leave their posts. Clarke is an especially malignant force in English cricket with a unique blend of detachment, entitlement, arrogance and short-term thinking. As others have argued below, I don’t think it’s necessary to posit a replacement in order to validly call for his head.
Clarke’s background was in banking, off licences and pet shops, followed by the chairmanship of Somerset CCC. That is not a CV of such spectacular confluence of skills and experiences that we shall not find his like again. There must by myriad individuals who possess sufficient experience of life, cricket, business, and committee work. What really matters is that the next chair puts *supporters* first, and I would hope that he or she comes from something other than the usual background – the City and a county chairmanship.
Paul Downton’s two main acts have been to fire Pietersen without proper explanation and then re-hire a coach who wasn’t very good the first time. I think we can survive without him, and there will be plenty of other people around with experience of management and top-level sport. It’s never been totally clear exactly what the England MD does, anyway.
As for Moores – on this blog we argued against his appointment, but dismissing him at this present moment may cause more disruption than it does good. The person I’d like to see as coach, to echo several other people, is Jason Gillespie.
I would replace Cook with Root, although I’m not entirely convinced by him. If we were asking the same question in a year’s time – not entirely unlikely – I might go for Ballance.
The wider point is that neither the management nor the coach score the runs and wickets which win test matches. The role of the coach has undergone vast mission creep over the last fifteen years: their job, surely, is to support and grow the players, not to act as a football-style manager. They should be sublimating their own egos and status beneath those of the performers.
At present I’d like to focus on the ECB. They have systemically insulted, disenfranchised, and dispossessed the supporter base, but see no contradiction in simultaneously ratcheting up ticket prices and hiving the game off to Sky.
David Collier was on R5 this morning. He was asked about declining interest after 8.4m watched the 2005 Ashes. His response was to boast about 1.3bn watching the T20 finals day. Mainly, one assumes, in India.
This was a perfect example of the ECB’s contempt for English fans without Sky. It won’t be picked up because everyone is banging on about bullying and Twitter accounts. They’ve been getting away with this sort of argument for years.
Arron that is a very revealing comment from Collier,and is depressingly the way the ECB sees the game today.
So the 2005 Ashes is compared to one 20/20 finals day? Dear oh dear. These people have contempt for the game and the England supporters. Everything is about Indian TV audiences. But they need that TV money form India to buy off the counties who vote these clowns into office.
I’ve been corrected. It was actually the Champions Trophy final of 2013, hence the large Indian audience. They were watching it on Star Sports (Murdoch), presumably.
The point stands anyway. It has absolutely no relevance to what Garry Richardson was asking, and I wish he’d pushed that further instead of asking Collier “does England need Pietersen” four times.
In the 1990s as the wrongful convictions from the 1970s were revealed there were many in gov who thought it would have been better if the new evidence had never been revealed. One senior judge even said it would be better for innocent men to stay locked up rather than undermine the integrity of the whole system.
It’s very much the establishment way. The ECB line that is emerging is very similar. Rather than deal with the allegations and new evidence the official line is to blame KP for tarnishing this period of England cricket history. Cook says……… “I do believe that era has been tarnished, and I am sad about that.” Got that? KP is to blame for revealing the truth.
Strauss takes a similar line……. “A lot of this that’s going on is madness. There’s been a lot of rumour, innuendo and opinion. I prefer to stick with the facts.”…………… A typical arrogant response from mr Strauss. He will stick to the facts don’t you know. But which facts will Mr
establishment be sticking to? The ones revealed by Alec Stewart that goes against the ECB ? The ones revealed by ex players and opposition players about the bullying of fielders? The facts of the dossier detailing the lunacy of Flowers obsession with KP.? I don’t think mr Strauss is very interested in those facts.
Strauss goes on to play the same tune “All this tit-for-tat stuff, I don’t think really helps the England cricket team.” Again, the team is suffering because the truth has been revealed. If only it had all been hushed up, we could all pretend everything Is fine and dandy..
How very English establishment.
Exactly, Mark. It’s unbelievably infuriating that, in spite of everything, they refuse to engage with the slightest part of it.
What tarnished that era was the way we buggered it all up in short order. We weren’t exactly #1 for a decade, were we? Instead it all went to pot – well beaten by SA, humiliated by Pakistan, slapped about a bit by Sri Lanka, brought down a peg by NZ, before being given the mother of all hidings by Australia.
Sure, good things happened during that run – India (thanks KP! And Cook!) for example. And you can never really complain about a 3-0 Ashes win.
But boy oh boy… we’re not stupid, you know. It’s not KP’s fault that our excellence was squandered.
Nick Comptons opinion is the one i’d like to hear the most, closely followed by Trott and Finn.
From my humble lowly perspective being one of those that’s ‘outside of cricket’ and all that i thought he was treated appallingly, for a debutant in India he done a very good job laying the platform with Cook and getting England off to important solid starts.
The 2 tons in NZ should have secured his Ashes place and he should have been told that after the tour but the the appalling man management struck yet again, why did he look all at sea and under so much pressure for the Home NZ series? what had they done to him? it looked like they had completely broken him like they eventually did with Finn and Trott but this was in record time.
I don’t think he played or was allowed to play his natural game in every test he played but he still done a good job up until the home NZ series where it fell apart.
I always remember Glen McGrath saying how under instruction he tried playing differently on his debut for Oz, he went for plenty and had one to forget, he said he then thought to himself that he’s going to play his natural game which was what got him into the team in the first place, the rest is history.
It’s highly depressing that our players are shackled like they are, Flower didn’t just suck the joy out of players he sucked their talent and natural games out of them too, i so miss the Vaughan days when the team went out there and aggressively went for it, the shackles were off back in those days and it was great to watch, that’s how the game should be played.
I agree with you about Compton. But I don’t think he will speak out (if he even wants to) if he hopes to get back into the team. I thought he was harshly treated. I am not saying he would have become a top player for England but it seemed odd the way he was dropped.
Didn’t his 2 centuries come at a time when dear leader scored none? Was it his batting or something else? Perhaps there is a dossier on him.
Compton’s an interesting one. There were rumours about the way he was treated at the time, even from the more pro-ECB journos. The gist was that what is now described as the Bowling Clique took against him and made it clear they didn’t want him in the team.
Compton may still harbour a belief he can play for England again – Robson certainly hasn’t made his place secure – so he, and any other player wishing to play for England, will keep that in mind when they speak. I don’t think anyone’s suggesting Finn was a victim of bullying, and he seems to get on with the other bowlers well. He was out with Swann the other night. The really revealing one would be Trott. This business about the organized apologies in front of the whole team sounds like hazing – take an introverted, mentally fragile guy and ritually humiliate him.
The problem is that Trott still believes he can play for England again. I wish he could, but I think it’s sadly fantasy. I imagine he’ll write his own book one day and that could be the most telling of all. Monty may well be in a similar boat.
On a separate point:
“i so miss the Vaughan days when the team went out there and aggressively went for it, the shackles were off back in those days and it was great to watch, that’s how the game should be played.”
Vaughan’s description is slightly more nuanced than that. He says that, yes, he was a very shackle-free, aggressive, go for the win all the time player, but what made him successful was his partnership with Fletcher, who was quite in the Flower mold: conservative, safety first, dry. The difference with Fletcher was his vision to see that the contrasting styles made the best combination – free-spirited aggression partnered with a cool, cautious head. Flower, though, went for a captain in his own vein, leading to that dry, joyless, go for the draw first brand of cricket. Win by attrition. Shame.
Can’t take issue with any of that, except – “Fletcher, who was quite in the Flower mold…”
Fletcher was not a control freak.
Well, the sentence was ‘who was quite in the Flower mold: conservative, safety first, dry’ making clear it was a reference to style and tactics.
That said, Fletcher’s autobiography revealed him to be extraordinarily thin skinned and prone to holding petty grudges for decades. There were players he took against for very flimsy reasons. Whilst he was certainly a more relaxed character than Flower, worth pondering whether Flower’s style of management would have been tolerated had it not been preceded by Fletcher’s long tenure.
Compton, Patel, Bopara, and Panesar. All these players could have probably been contributing to the ODI and Test and T20 teams. It’d be fascinating to hear an unfiltered version of their opinions on what’s been going on for the last few years.
Could Compton yet return? Robson was not offered a central contract. Or will they go for Lees/Lyth? If Harris and Johnson are both fit for next summer, there is a very strong argument that NC’s experience and composure would be just the ticket.
Frank Partridge, the situation you describe is the one that the ECB has created. In the words of the Irish taxi driver, we should not be starting from here. This is like Australia in the mid 1980s. Pick the players with promise, appoint a captain with balls and be prepared to lose a lot of matches. The captain is simply the most experienced player on the pitch. No magic is needed. Cook is getting worse rather than better as a captain. Roll the dice. Have some practice matches under different captains and see who does best. Don’t have the cheek to ask people who are outside cricket and don’t know these guys to make the calls.
We don’t have time for these experiments. We have less than 10 months to find a team to regain the Ashes! Dismantling everything won’t work.
I don’t have much confidence we’ll get the ashes back with the current set up. And to be honest, it’s doubtful I’ll bother following it.
And that speaks volumes. I’m guessing you take your cricket seriously, Badger, and your disillusionment with English cricket illustrates the real issue with this affair.
It’s the only sport I really enjoy, to the extent that I’ll happily watch a test between other nations. The last few years though, even our victories haven’t been that enjoyable with the style of cricket we’ve been playing. Some of the attitudes of the players and the way they’ve “gone about their business” has really put me off. The whole “face doesn’t fit” of Compton, Panesar, etc and the KP sacking and its fallout has shown me what it was that I sensed was wrong. I went to Lords for the Sri Lanka test this summer and was more interested in cheering Sangakarra and Jayawardene – I actually wanted Sri Lanka to win the series, I was so disillusioned with England. However, even that series loss didn’t seem to change the ECB’s opinion.
I’ve packed in my Sky Sports subscription and I’m not even sure I can stomach TMS anymore. Maybe a dismal showing at the World Cup might change things and I’ll be in better spirits next summer.
I believe this is exactly the time to experiment. The dismantling has already happened – no KP, Swann, Trott, Prior and still no replacement for Strauss. This is the consequence of Geoff Miller’s we’ve picked the 11 best players (in our view) and we’re not picking anyone else. A well constructed England squad needs 3 dependable openers, at least 4 quickies, 2 spinners, 2 keepers.
Don’t believe we should worry about the next Ashes other than making a good fist of it. Longer term is my concern.
Frank, dealing with the mess that the ECB has created is of FAR more importance than next year’s Ashes.
You may have to accept that the job of rebuilding English test cricket after the 2013/14 Ashes series will take longer than the next Ashes series.
I remember when, in the golden glow of the 2006/07 Ashes win, it seemed like half of the Australian team left. And what’s worse is that it felt like the best half. I knew, then, that the next Ashes series was likely to go to England and that the Australian team was going to be spending quite a bit of time “rebuilding.”
That’s why I was not at all surprised that England managed to win three Ashes series in a row. I wasn’t happy about it but I wasn’t surprised. And when Australia went to England in mid-2013 I did not anticipate an Australian win. Which is lucky, because it meant that I wasn’t disappointed.
England has just had a few giants leave (or get booted from) the side. Finding people to fill the gaps could happen tomorrow, or it could happen a few years hence. Either way, fixing the ECB is something that can’t wait.
For a bit of light relief:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/cricket/article-2788319/kevin-pietersen-s-book-rocked-cricket-dig-little-deeper-ll-real-story-hypocrite.html
I found the 5Live Special revealing on Tuesday night. KP was asked by the ECB to write a report on the state of the game and how best to move forward, after the 08 WIndies tour. Senior players including Harmison, advised him, against KPs better judgement, to be as honest as posible about the dynamics between Moores Flower and the senior players. The results are history as we know.
In terms of the bullying. The great ECB mouyhpiece, Agnew, has consistently reported over the last year or two about the awful attitude England have carried recently. One match referee has said that England are the most unpopular team on the circuit – in terms of how they treat each other, the opposition and the officials.
In terms of “tough environment”, yes there are times when you will rag your colleagues for messing up. Us bowlers hat feeling we aren’t backed up by the fielders. If that ragging is the norm I would say that’s different. Broad,
Im personally very disappointed. This should have been kept begin closed doors though. If the set-up hadn’t have had a culture of retaining their senior players, whatever their form, KP could have been dropped and words could have been had about any misconduct. If he truly was keen on playing for England he could have gone away, scored for Surrey, and come back and picked up where he left off. If he was not interested, England could have dropped him and someone else taken his place.
KP isn’t blameless in this, but the management are hugely culpable for a terrible mess and the loss of the best player we have had for generations
Not sure if I am trying to read into what Cook said tonight. It did seem that the TV version was edited from the piece I read in the DT. Mind you it could be my OAP brain taking a nosedive! I seemed to sense there were things in what he said, and Strauss has said, that have been somewhat, dare I say, missed?
Strauss: Andrew Strauss insists that it is a ‘good thing to have conflict’ in a team – as long as the whole side are ‘united by a common purpose’. But Strauss believes it is a ‘myth’ that all successful sides are fully harmonious and act like the characters in The Waltons – an American television series based around a family who all get along well and achieve a positive outcome from a difficult situation as a result.
Hmm! I’ll come back to that one in a minute.
Cook did admit that things in the dressing room got out of hand.
Cook: “Certainly at some stages those frustrations probably boiled over more than they should have done, but that was only people desperate to succeed and wanting to know the other 10 blokes around them were committed 100 per cent to them.
“Did it over step the mark a couple of times? Possibly, but we addressed those issues — this always happens in teams. It certainly wasn’t a ‘bullying environment’ as such at all in my eyes.”
So England players do not deny negative stuff went on but they won’t call it bullying. So we dress it all up and tell everyone oh yeh it did get a bit heated but that is because we are “committed” to the England cause?
Now I seem to recall a totally different attitude from Alastair Cook when Shane Warne said Cook should not be Captain. Cook was seething about it. Clarke stormed off to Sky to tell them to do something about it. Then when Swann got his teeth into Cook, he was very angry indeed.
Cook said: “I don’t think it’s that helpful, especially from a so-called friend.”
What about the Warne/Cook incident:’ Warne also refuted Cook’s suggestions that his negative comments were a “personal attack” as a means to undermine the 29-year-old’s authority.’
It does sort of beg the question: why is it okay for some England players to feel aggrieved and feel that someone’s opinion is “personal Attack?” Swann on TMS that Cook should not be captain, and Cook feels this is unacceptable from a “so-called friend!”
Now going back to Strauss. How does his view of how an England Dressing Room and Team should act differ with Cook’s. Strauss says in one piece that it is not the Waltons and not meant to be friendly but must be a place where people speak their minds for the good of the team to win. Cook on the other hand says it has to be a happy chappy place.
Is it me or is this where the whole “feed in” line from the ECB didn’t quite come off? Two different views? All cloaked in a “England is forever” sort of battle cry but it just doesn’t ring true. Bullying must be very different then from “personal attacks?” So setting up the Twitter account was a bit of a laugh then? Undermining someone in public was okay because, says the ECB, there was no evidence of wrong doing by the players. Shane Warne pops up his head and says what most of the folk think and it is a “personal attack” and Giles Clarke runs like hell as tho his feet were on fire to get that terrible foreigner chastised!
Hypocrisy rules. Not sure if this is clear really. It’s late and I’m tired and off to bed. Cheer all. Great article Maxie – as usual!!!
Perfectly clear that!
Annie, great point about the so called bullying of Cook by Warne. Funny how the ECB acted in that case. Couldn’t wait to intervene.
First 3 articles on cricinfo are Cook, Anderson and Strauss saying how damaging this is for England.
No. What’s damaging for England is the terrible way KP was and is being treated since 2009. And I say that as a die hard follower since the mid 70s who grew up watching Mike Hendricks, Christ Old, Derek Randall and other greats.
Cook, Anderson, Strauss, it is the 3 of you who have and are damaging England, supported by the ECB and the complicit media.
This will never be forgotten, never mind brushed under the carpet.
“This will never be forgotten, never mind brushed under the carpet”.
Hear hear.
Mike Hendrick*
I like how you’ve corrected Mike Hendrick but are happy with Christ Old. Were you born in God’s own county?
:)
I expected no different from Cook, quintessential ‘Company Man’ that he is. In fairness, I would not expect different of ANY current England player, as they all are employees of the ECB and would be expected to ‘align with’ the Company position in public and not bring it into disrepute. Equally, ANY player harbouring hopes of a call-up/recall to the England Team will not stick his head above the parapet and back up KP, seeing what candour appears to have done for KP’s England career. After all, virtually every commentator seems to have written off the chances of KP ever returning to the England team, since he has apparently “burnt his bridges” (I strongly disagree).
What we are seeing is Typical corporate behaviour and response, designed to regiment employees, now implemented unreservedly in a sporting body like the ECB. We will thus have to wait for these players to retire/give up hope of playing for England before they articulate their views. At which point the establishment will dismiss such a perspective as the bitter carping of an ex-/has-been player!
But yet two can play the corporate vs employee game, as KP has proven this week. The ECB is liable to be hauled up like any other corporate employer. Hence it would not surprise me if an employee (read player) decided to burn his bridges with the England set-up and haul the ECB over the coals for creating a permissive environment for bullying and intimidation, or for wrongful/constructive dismissal if denied a central contract.
The monumental short-sightedness of the ECB in taking the supporters for granted, as cattle to be led by their noses to the till to empty pockets on match tickets/TV subscriptions, simply beggars belief. The backlash against this antiquated approach has been simmering. The disdain with which KP was despatched and yet all others associated with the doomed Ashes lionised, and the supporters dismissed as being ‘outside cricket’ has been the matchstick to start this brushfire. The ECB need to beware that this does not become a conflagration that burns the entire edifice of English cricket – the current anger might well lead to that!
“Hopefully if he can get through his really nasty injury”
This was the part I liked best. This is the very same “nasty injury” that Prior had in June, when he claimed he was fit enough to play five back-to-back tests and Chairman of Selectors James Whitaker assured us that he was “100% fit.”
My first thought was: Uh-oh, the drip-drip-drip of negative comment about Jos Buttler is about to begin. Though to be honest, the boy is so much an unfinished article when it comes to keeping that negative comment is inevitable anyway. I just hope he can score enough runs to keep his doubters (including me) silent. He did reasonably well in the tests, but afterwards he fell apart in the county championship, and I heard a lot of muttering from Lanky supporters at Hove. We shouldn’t forget that he has never kept for a whole season before, having always shared glove duties with Kieswetter.
All I’d ask with Buttler (or any player) is that criticism is relevant (i.e. about his playing ability – not nonsense like “anonymous in the field” or “can’t make dressing room speeches”) and proportionate (i.e. the standards expected aren’t suddenly wildly different to those expected of other players). It would also help if the criticisms aren’t just ridiculous conservatism (e.g. “too young”, “gives his wicket away by trying occasionally to hit the ball off the square”) or virtually identical across different cricket correspondents (we might start thinking the dressing room that never leaks is leaking again).
What kind of statement would it if, as soon as Prior is just about fit enough to play, he comes straight back in and replaces Buttler? I wouldn’t put it past them…
I summed up the Cook interview btl on the Guardian like this:
So this is it? Paul Downton, the man who had so much to say in May, has had 11 days now to give his side of the story. And still nothing.
Instead we have the England captain in a carefully stage-managed interview — open-necked, ‘smart casual’ t-shirt (endearingly crumpled), manly stubble — god, he looks beautiful! — bucolic setting, delivering stuttering answers to patsy, approved-in-advance questions from an unnamed and unseen interviewer.
“Can we take that one again from the top, Mr. Sheep. And this time, be careful to look at me, not down at your shoes. And…take four!”
Damage control PR at its finest. The only thing missing was the soft background music.
Contrast to Pietersen’s performances all week — fielding all questions from press and public alike “with aplomb” as Selvey might say, incredibly nervous at first but increasingly confident. It’s night and day, closed society manipulated information versus open society frankness. [I haven’t seen all Pietersen’s interviews and appearances, and I’m told he didn’t come over well on the Graham Norton show.]
He was out of his depth on Norton – the last statement Norton made to him was “Team sports, can I just say, I believe, maybe they’re not for you?” Which made me chuckle a little bit! But in terms of Buttler his keeping was no worse than Prior’s when he finished in the summer. Cook’s statement that he isn’t ready for Test cricket was more to do with keeping his friends close than for genuine cricket reasons. When Prior started he was probably worse keeping wise than Buttler, so it was really a nonsense.
Norton would have thought up that line days in advance and saved it for right at the end, when KP was unable to reply. That’s okay, that’s GN’s thing. KP shouldn’t have gone on there in the first place — a rare slip by his team.
Cook needed Prior to chair the team meetings so he was always a nose in front when selection time came
Wonderful stuff, Clive.
That’s another thing. If the situation even interpersonally was all that clear cut, what was there ever stopping any of these nameless legions of players from even doing so much as stepping up and saying, “Well, actually, no, he was a pain in the rear end and I’ve been much calmer and played better since he was gone. In fact here’s a story about him overreacting to something completely trivial. That, all the time….” Not even something like that.
Instead, there is never ANYTHING, even in the range of a personal negative opinion, that comes back from an identifiable return address. That’s what it all comes back to.
I tend to think they got rid of him for being annoying, but that he was only really annoying in an /exemplary/ fashion when he was in the course of being /right/ about something that subsequently in their hands went /wrong/. Thus the steadfast silence.
You’ve absolutely nailed it, Pontiac.
People who hear me bang on about this wrongly assume I’m in love with Pietersen. I’ve never met him and have no personal fealty to a multi-millionaire with a powerful PR infrastructure.
But I’ve been enraged by the travesty to natural justice which attended his sacking; by the ingratitude of so much of the English cricket community to a player who contibuted so much on the field; and by the arrogance and deceit of the ECB.
That’s why I’ve laboured to unpick the allegations made against him, to make the point that the case against him is based on virtually no credible, substantiated evidence which stands up to the slightest scrutiny.
Cook appears all puppyish and blames KP for diminishing the shortest great era ever and upsetting his mates through a series of unthruths. Still no references to Prior’s integrity evidenced by the apparent “dishonesty” about his fitness for the first four Tests of the summer, then. Nor Alec Stewart putting Broad and Swann (and for what its worth Bresnan) in the frame…
Please don’t talk about anything relating to this Mark; you risk tarnishing Alastair Cook’s memories.
Harmison certainly puts the cat among the pigeons, when he talks about Broad “scared s..tless” when he see that he has a phone call from Flower. Total panic it seems. I mentioned it on Twitter and Nick Hoult said he forgot all about that interview but he was there at the time when Broad talked about it. Not exactly a good, flourishing, friendly man-manager then? Very interesting perspective from Harmison. http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/sport/cricket/steve-harmison-fear-english-cricket-7921279
Does anyone know about the argument between Aggers and Mrs KP last week. Aggers has quit Twtter and left it to the “bullies and trolls” etc etc!
Mrs KP re KP Genius: “anyone with a brain” would understand how the account would work before Agnew advised her to “lose the attitude”. Not sure whether this attack by Agnew could not be construed as bullying. Taylor then posted: “I am not fighting anyone’s battles. As a wife and mother, I have ever right to defend my family when I see fit. I make no apologies for that.” The Mirror seemed to be suggesting that Taylor set up the KPGenius Account. Is that right or has the Mirror writer just made faux pas?
Some has suggested that Aggers was tweeted that it was hoped he would be the first Brit to get Ebola? If that is so then it is unacceptable. If someone did say that on Twitter then they should be banned for life.
Just had a tweet from Nick Hoult who says he thinks Aggers has just come back on. Some very funny things going on and no mistake.
Aggers has been pushing the ECB line that the fake twitter account was not run from the dressing room. He has been very strong on this point. How he knows for sure I have no idea. But he does drink in the same pub as the father of the man who ran the account. (Rather suspicious)
Anyway, KPs wife was pointing out that other players had the password for the account and therefore could sign in and tweet. Making KPs point that the account was not just being run but some fan. Aggers got very upset about this (rather too upset I my mind) particularly in light of what was revealed by Alec Stewart.
Aggers just could not understand the point she was making.
Namely if they were not running the account from the dressing room, as claimed by Aggers, why did they have the password? Aggers came across as rather stupid and seemed to not understand the basics of running a twitter account. Some idiot made the Ebola comment and he shut down his account. He will be back. When enough of his fans beg loudly.
Oh thanks for that. Got really confused with how it was written in the D Mirror. I think the way Aggers spoke to Jessica was a disgrace actually. I would be offended if someone spoke to me in that fashion. Come to think about it, just occurred to me, two people did that to me because I supported my husband. My “evidence” was thrown across the room by one man and then I was told I had no right to say anything at all. Interesting really as when I finally told my husband he wrote a real retort to this bloke and he felt he should apologise to me. In the end all the “evidence” so-called ended up being shredded because these people broke the law. Hmm. Wonder if this will happen in KPs case. I won’t hold my breath. Of course if the ECB has broken the law etc and found out then of course they could be sued. We could have but didn’t and left them to eat humility. They’ve hated us ever since. That’s what can happen when one stands up for someone who is being mercilessly bullied. Hmm.
Thanks very much for the explanation. Cheers. So good of you to do that.
Lose the attitude!
I didn’t say anything wrong did I Maxie?
I was being tongue in cheek, Annie! It was a reference to a high-profile Twitter spat the other day.
I did think the tweet to Aggers from Cameron was terrible and said so. Just not good. Sinking to that level is unacceptable.
Andy Flower has been praised a lot over the last few days – and often in nearly the same words. Above all else, he has integrity. “Great integrity” (Strauss), “superb integrity” (Clarke).
The thing is, and without godwinning explicitly, some of the worst people of all time have integrity. Is being very, very consistent really something to be that proud of? This is the one thing the his supporters reach for first, and oddly it seems to fit with the picture that those who dislike Flower paint.
Someone with superb integrity would pretty much have to be a vengeful, rigid grudge-holder, incapable of altering their approach to deal with difficult individuals; forgiveness, changing one’s mind, accommodating others, all mean accepting inconsistency.
What picture of Flower emerges from the dossier? Is it perhaps a man so driven to fury by Pietersen’s remarks in a private players-only meeting that he refused to speak to him for a week, and began taking notes each time he looked out of the window.
Stephen Brenkley in the Independent takes great pains to redress the image of Flower presented by Pietersen, but ends up, with this anecdote achieving the complete opposite:
“Flower can be a tetchy sod. His wariness of the press burgeoned during his seasons in charge of England. He did not warm to the regular routine of press conferences and they became fewer. He always tried, he weighed every question as if he were being asked to comment on the meaning of life and he knew every word that was written.
“After England’s heavy loss to South Africa at The Oval in 2012 (the visitors made 637 for 2 against the world’s top-ranked team) there was an unseemly kerfuffle. Flower was declining to appear to speak to the press then or the next day and the team media-relations officer was hounded ferociously. My swift contribution to this ragtag debate was that Flower would regret his stance.
“Dashing to the train a couple of hours later, the story of England’s demise written for that day, the mobile went. It was Flower seeking an explanation about the threat to him. The explanation, that he would regret it when he came to realise that he should have spoken about such an overwhelming defeat because the fans deserved it, was brushed aside. Flower was upset and obsessive: four times the train went into tunnels with reception lost and four times he rang back. He also imparted during that discussion that there was nothing in his contract that said he had to speak to the press. Well, there should have been.
“It seemed obsessive behaviour for a man whose side had just been hammered to be calling a reporter. He rang three others that evening as well. But that in a way summed him up – driven, particular, wanting to do what was best for his team”.
http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/cricket/kevin-pietersen-autobiography-kp-will-not-cast-feats-of-andy-flower-into-the-shadows-9789357.html
Agreed Maxie. Flower might have “superb integrity”, whatever that might mean, but he comes across as mean-spirited, fanatical, obsessive, thin-skinned…
I do like your title for this post, and I wonder if a suitable new nickname for the very wonderful England captain might be Nipper…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nipper
Totally agree with Nipper.
Thanks, Zeph…I did slightly have that image in mind at the time!
It’s like the Chinese Water Torture…drip, drip, drip….Strauss, Cook, Collier, and doubtless a few more until they think the victim (us), will cry “enough, we can’t stand anymore!!” Then, when we’ve had enough, maybe one of our Lords and Masters will deign to put in an appearance and instruct us on how naughty we all were, and to mend our ways, quick sharp!!
When we’ve had enough? What makes them or anyone think that we’re going to give up?? This is far, far worse than the way Gower was treated, or Richards and Garner (by Somerset). I don’t think the ECB or their media fanboys have a clue yet.But they will.
At least with Gower, he was dropped rather than sacked for good – and although Gooch and Dexter handled it clumsily, their reasoning was rather more transparent than the handling of Pietersen.
The thing that still, for me, makes the Gower situation worse was that Gatting was recalled as soon as his ban ended. He was the same age, his Test record was significantly inferior to Gower’s, and he’d led a disastrous tour of apartheid South Africa. He should never even have been considered for England again. I’ve taken due account of his grievances about being sacked as captain in 1988 and overlooked in 1989, and frankly they are no mitigation at all.
In the immortal words of Martin Johnson: “The more cynically inclined might feel that an aeroplane ride to Johannesburg is less of a misdemeanour than a spin in a Tiger Moth.”
It absolutely infuriates me how anyone at the ECB can talk about loyalty or pulling for the team in any way when they have no issues employing Gooch and Gatting. What they did is infinitely worse than anything Pietersen has ever done.
I think 25 years ago when they were talking about bringing back the rebels, it was Rob Bailey who pointed out that he and others who had chosen to turn down invitations and try and earn an England place were the ones who had been treated with contempt. And he was right.
“What they did is infinitely worse than anything Pietersen has ever done”.
You sure about that?
Gooch and Gatting merely abandoned their team, their team-mates, and English cricket for three years each in order to prop up the apartheid regime in return for cash.
They both later became selectors; Gooch became captain, and later, a senior coach; Gatting is employed by the ECB and is currently MCC President.
Pietersen, by contrast:
– Failed to disagree with a friend’s description of Strauss as a doos, in a private BBM message.
– Described Michael Carberry as “useless”, but not when Carberry was in earshot.
– Wanted time off between two tests to play an IPL game.
– Looked out of the window.
Not on topic, well, sort of, but this little nugget has got me as mad as hell!!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/cricket/international/england/11157141/Sky-Sports-stumps-BT-Sport-in-battle-for-crickets-biggest-international-events.html
A good week to bury bad news indeed! The game we love has been lost to millions in this country for years to come!
Not surprising we aint heard anything from Clarke, Downton, and the new bloke, because they’re all busy counting their “stitch up” money!!
I’m sure far better brains than the worn out one I’ve got, will be able to analyse the ramifications of this in some detail, but, one thing stands out, disconnection, and disenchantment notwithstanding, is that the Counties will be in the ECB’s back pocket for years to come! In my simplistic view, considering the calibre of those in charge, this aint good!!
My anti ECB stance has thus been reinforced, my vehemance is palpable, therefore requiring me to change my username from “the other Dave”
Dave, If you ignore the under 19 events, and the various qualifying tournaments it actually only amounts to just these…….and we don’t care about ODIs anyway, we are told.
ICC major global events
ICC World Twenty20 2016 – India
ICC Champions Trophy 2017 – England and Wales
ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 – England and Wales
ICC World Twenty20 2020 – Australia
ICC Champions Trophy 2021 – India
ICC Cricket World Cup 2023 – India
Star in India won the rights from ICC (Murdoch owned) who then controls where the rights are distributed to. Ie Sky in England. The Murdoch/ECB marriage stinks. But it is like a giant octopus with tentacles and conflicts of interest everywhere. Sky commentators writing articles for Murdoch newspapers defending ECB. It’s corporate Pravda.
I did laugh at this from Giles Clark…..
“We have witnessed a massive change in the spectator experience at our grounds and we are now in a position to underpin these exciting new developments.”
Yea, massive change, you now have to take out a mortgage to buy a ticket.
.
Genuine question: did I miss the announcement that the ICC men’s World T20 is no longer to be a biennial event? No tournament is scheduled for 2018.
Also, it’s interesting that the nations outside the big three haven’t even been given a World T20 in the next eight years. After the disaster of 2007, perhaps I can just about accept this for the ODI World Cup. But weren’t the 2010 (West Indies) and 2012 (Sri Lanka) World T20s pretty successful?
Good spot. But why would the ICC want to wind back on the T20 – a lucrative tournament which arouses fewer complaints of overkill?
The schedule does have a suspiciously Big Three look to it. Are India now hosting every third World Cup?
Arron great point about no venue outside the big 3 for the next 8 years. Quite shocking.
I’m sure our great cricket media will be right on it. Selbey/Pringle/Newman will be writing a piece as we speak………..Oh wait!
The “spectator experience” is a bloody laughable comment! Cricket fans? Cricketing public? Cricket lovers? Not on your Nelly! Ripped off for ticket prices. Sat in a plastic seat you can just about fit your ass on. No leg room. “Official Partners” beer and burgers of dubious origin, and generally talked down to and treat like shit….yea right…how good is that! I’ve had enough! I’ll stick with TMS and C5…it’ll just have to do!!
Explains partly why Clarke’s been quiet the last few days. But does anyone think he’d have piped up if not esconced in ICC horse-trading?
Remember the 1999 World Cup, when the BBC had the rights to some of the games? What a shame that in 2019 the tournament will be here, but televised only to a minority.
Another interesting passage from the book. Remember Mike Selvey’s articles in spring 2013, after Pietersen privately told the ECB that he wanted to be allowed to miss the one-day series?
Thanks for this, Clive, and for all the other excerpts you’ve posted here.
It’s a shame that the more lurid and pantomime aspects of the book have completely overshadowed the revelations it makes about the ECB machine.
They also ignore Pietersen’s humour, which came as a pleasant surprise to me. Also the chapter on friendships, not only in the IPL but also at Nottinghamshire (where he is supposed to have had not a single friend remaining when he left — actually, one of his friends left with him) and elsewhere. He remains close to people he has known from boyhood (his closest friend of all died shortly before the ill-fates Ashes 2013 tour) and speaks to his three brothers everyday.
He contrasts the mutual respect fostered in the IPL with the moronic level of aggression expected against the opposition at all times in the England camp, aggression that is even directed towards team mates.
I’ve just been listening to part of the interview with Adrian Chiles last week, and one thing that comes across is that, like him or not, Pietersen has a fine cricket brain. And how it was wasted.
“Talk soon. Hopefully your headlines will help this delicate situation.”
But they absolutely don’t leak. You have there evidence of a blatant conspiracy. They are conspiring with the media, for their own benefit.
I must admit, I do find it fascinating how the mainstream media have largely ignored Harmison’s remarks. It’s not like he’s come out strongly on Pietersen’s side – it’s balanced, thoughtful and critical in several directions.
Yet all I can see is one reference to it in the Guardian. How odd.
Nick Hoult makes some reference to it, I think, and he Tweeted it. But overall you’re right. Because they don’t trawl through the regional press in much detail?
I thought Harmison provided compelling testimony – non-partisan, authoritative, and providing real information rather than gossip.
Quite a few journalists retweeted a reference to it, and many praised it as being excellent (which it was).
It seems to me that the media have a bit of a problem with an authoritative voice using the “he’s a bit of an idiot, but he has a point” line. It’s as though it’s too nuanced for a headline.
A very interesting element of the Pietersen book coverage was that it became mainstream, headline news, not just something for the cricket pages. Five Live breakfast devoted their hour-long phone-in to the story. Have I Got News For You covered it.
This has meant the story has obviously had to be simplified in some ways – to make sense to mainstream audiences who, unlike us, haven’t spent years picking through the undergrowth and are less familiar with the narrative.
The idea of mixed guilt, or that his points had varying degrees of validity, were unlikely to cut through.
Mike Walters poses some very valid questions here:
http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/cricket/kevin-pietersen-high-maintenance-indiscreet-deserves-4426654
I wonder why he takes such a markedly different stance from almost all his Fleet St colleagues?
He always has done. He’s been critical of Flower/the ECB on a number of occasions and not just recently. I’d love to know where he’s coming from and why too.
I’ll approach him later in the year and see if he’d up for an interview with us.
You can ask him directly the question of mine he didn’t answer ;-)
I didn’t catch that, but you could send it to me at maxie@thefulltoss.com
Thought this might be of interest – even if only for the inadvertent dig at Paul Newman,
http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/peter-oborne/2014/10/the-unbearable-ingratitude-of-kevin-pietersen/
Can some one please set up a protest page WeWant KP Back for the fans, instead of all this talking I would set up a page but not knowledge to attempt the task. So please some one out there take this mantle on