Pretty much agree with all that, Bob. I have over many years followed England quite closely, but I am now wondering how up I will be even for this summer's Ashes.

And for folk saying that positions 3 -5 are pretty well catered for just now, well yes they are in relative terms. But as a cricketer a place could/should certainly be found for KP. I'd open with Bell and have Cook, Bell, Ballance, KP, Root, Moeen Ali. But we all know it's about much more than that and cricketers don't usually get told that they are not playing again.

Loved his timing with the meeting already arranged with Strauss for last night ( and the decision presumably made to say no way, Jose ), 300 plus not out for Surrey vs Leicestershire. And while the Oval can be a flat track and Leicestershire aren't great shakes, interviews last night with folk who saw it ( and not just KP supporters ) suggest it was a pretty phenomenal innings.

It rather looks as if the new chairman of the ECB got his script wrong. Whatever his words were very misleading and KP was misled to his cost. Very unprofessional.

To me frankly the England side and administrators have had a bit of a stench about them for some time. They have at times appeared cliquish and also bullying, observed even by ( don't rock the boat ) Jonathan Agnew, let alone KP. The England team are also reportedly amongst the most unpopular with other sides and with umpires.

All very sad.

Bob in Spain wrote:

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Just wondering where people stand on the KP situation.  I admit that I am a big fan of his. Purely from a sporting perspective, he is box office and clearly still able to produce the goods.  I accept that he can be difficult to manage at times.  It would be safe to call him a "Maverick" and I am sure others would have some different choices of words to describe him.  The strange thing is, for me, many "Mavericks" during their playing era, are often recognized later to be the some of the games most intelligent thinkers.  Botham is probably the best cricketing example and from tennis, I would put John McEnroe in the same category.

There is no doubt that KP upset the apple cart with his book, but I refuse to believe he is the only "difficult" person in (or not in) the squad.  I always believe that you should pick the best players for the team and in my book KP fits that bill.  There are 2 slots open in the top 6 at the moment, with Trott retiring and for me, the Nº6 spot is still open.  Cook, Ballance, Bell and Root are set in stone.

But of course, his omission from future plans has nothing to do with playing ability at all.  For me, it is an abject failure of management to manage a troublesome genius.  They talk of "trust issues".  How does anyone trust THEM with the way KP has been treated recently.

He was told by the incoming chairman of the ECB that the slate was being wiped clean.  If he came back to county cricket and scored runs, he would be considered for selection. As a result of that, he gave up a contract reportedly for 250k pounds or more with the IPL. Now he has been told that whatever he does, he won't be considered. So he has been convinced to give up this contract on false pretenses.

What to me is even more staggering, is for Strauss to say we have massive trust issues and I can't work with him or have him in the team, and then in the next sentence, he offers him a job with the One Day team. This soap opera is taking on farcical proportions and is an embarrassment to English Cricket.  (Let's not even get into the manner in which the sacking of Peter Moores was handled.)

I also believe that Michael Vaughan and Alec Stewart were interested in the new Director of Cricket role. Both withdrew from the selection process with diplomatic comments about other commitments and seeing the role in a different way, but I wouldn't be surprised at all if both had said they would welcome KP back (both have tweeted support for him) and for this reason they were told that they would not get the job.

I will find it very difficult to support England this summer.

 

 

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 #straussout haha.

It's all about that texting controversy which KP regretted, upsetting team morale etc.,. I sit on the fence on this one. On the one hand I like KP and he should without doubt be selected now, but I just feel he might not be enough of a team man and can upset the dressing room, which is vital to success in team sport.

Ratty wrote:

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Off on a bit of a tangent ...

Obviously England weren't that great in the West Indies, but the difference between an OK 2-0 series win and a dreadful 1-1 draw was almost certainly Jos Buttler's missed stumping of Blackwood in the 4th innings in Barbados. Does anyone really think that the West Indies would have won from 87-5?

Cricket's a pretty brutal game, in that if you're a batsman your first mistake is generally your last. And runs of so-called bad form are often just runs of bad luck.

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It would have been a lot closer if he had taken the stumping, but I suspect the result would still have been the same.

The fact was that the second innings collapse didn't give the bowlers enough time to recover and they looked tired on the final day especially having to start bowling in the hottest part of the day.

If England had batted another session set them 250 and started bowling around tea time and had an overnight break they would have won comfortably.