KP the scapegoat for Ashes debacle, and it’s a disgrace

Yes, sooner or later England will lose another couple of series and sack the captain. And his replacement may well call for KP's reinstatement. Then there's Plan C; Pietersen could try to re-emigrate to New Zealand to continue his test career. You Kiwis out there, do you think you would have him?

Boycott as coach would be a step forward.

It seems that England indeed don;t have a better option than Cook and they indeed are in deep trouble. The only alternative I can suggest is to appoint Stuart Broad captain and recruit someone who has been a successful England captain (or at least a successful senior player) in the past to mentor him. Some one like Boycott, Botham or Vaughan. Someone with the smarts to give the right advice to the captain but who will let the actual captain make the final decision and not be a control freak. I have no idea whether Broad has any leadership ability but at the moment he is the only one who at least has enough credibility as a player. Ian Chappell has said that one of the things a good captain has to be able to do from time to time is to tell the coach and any extraneous team bureaucrats to p**s off. Given the brazen way in which Broad can pull the wool over an umpire's eyes in front of millions of flabbergasted TV viewers, and then perform in the face of the ensuing crowd hostility in Australia, he may well have the gumption to do that part of the job.

Indeed. Strange that of the 18 counties in the English first-class system, not one of them apparently is captained by a real leader of men who can be drafted into the national team to sort it out. They are stuck with Cook.

To be more precise, a South African-born Englishman was shafted by a Zimbabwean, with English accomplices.

Agree re Cook. He is fortunate that there is no obvious alternative for England captain.

Very point Ryan. In fact, you could argue that Warne was more disruptive than KP. Remember he was suspended for a year for a drug offence, and involved in the Bookmaker Controversy. I'm not sure that KP has ever committed an offence as serious as either of those. Warne did not get off scot-free of course; he did incur that suspension and he also never got the Australian captaincy, possibly partly because of his off-field record. It seems that the final straw was Pietersen stridently criticising Andy Flower in a private team meeting called by Cook and Prior. Well, in my book there is nothing wrong with that. He did not speak out in public or in an inappropriate forum: he was *asked* to state his opinion. He cannot be punished for holding an honest opinion. He can be punished for voicing it at the wrong place and time but in my book he did not do that. If anyone should be punished it is the player who leaked the comments. Geoff Boycott has made some excellent comments on the KP sacking on Cricinfo. Without coming down on one side or the other, he says that KP has a history and right or wrong, some people in the hierarchy finally got sick of him. He also says that Cook is a lovely bloke and a fine batsman, but he is not the sort of strong captain (a Vaughan or an Ian Chappell) that can keep a Kevin Pietersen in line. Part of the history involves friction between KP's responsibilities to the England team and his opportunities to earn more money in IPL etcetera. There are broader issues there for international cricket.

Its is always simplistic to base an analysis simply on statistics. Any thoughtfull analysis of the Ashes debarcle should concentrate on the glearing leadership problems of Cook. On the field he was largely lost and confused unable to either inspire his teammates nor implement any meaningful strategy to counter Australian tactics. Too many times on field Cook was sourrounded by teams mates all offering their opinions and ideas to a Captain that clearly had no idea. The Leadership or lack of it reminds me of the Ponting ashes tours of England he was equally out of his leadership depth.

So true. It is a disgrace. KP is the only English batsman that I actually want to watch bat. Guys like Root, Trott, Prior were all boring as hell, and while Cook is alright, he is hardly inspiring.

The slog-sweeps against Warne the off-drives against Glenn McGrath, the flamingo-like swivel shots against Jason Gillespie and best of all perhaps, the hook strokes from 150kph deliveries by Brett Lee May be a am over reacting, but. . . . .

when did KP slag his captain off on social media?

I know you are saying 'irrespective of the other baggage' - but thats the point. The ECB came out and said that IT WAS, at least in part, to do with that. As I said above, overall there is just about a case to be made that Pietersen is a little bit on the wane and could be dropped (not a case that I would agree with, but you could just about make a case) but as Ryan has so well pointed out, if you list all the issues that England had in the ashes, KP's play is not one of the more pressing issues.

So true Ryan. There is just, just, JUST, about a case to be made regarding his age, knee problems, form dipping. But it is just the constructive nature of it - drip drip drip of unexampled, unevidenced stuff about how he is bad for team morale. The implication of this is England players seem to be asking 'how can we possibly be expected to play well, do things like get in behind fast bowling and stop bowling half trackers when KP makes us so upset?'. I think fans expect professional athletes to be a bit more robust than this! Robustness was certainly not a word that you could use to describe their performance in the ashes. By acting out on this you are valedating Cook on his 'KP makes me sad and I can't possibly be expected to set sensible fields' point of view. i.e. acting like a bunch of 14 year old school girlfriends. Team spirit is important No doubt. But it depends what you mean by team spirit. If it is determination, a deep belief in each others abilities on the pitch, a belief that your team mate will have your back on the pitch then damn right that is important. But if is just, 'we don't like him and we should all be mates off the pitch' I don't think that is right or particularly healthy. The idea of the CEO of an organisation getting involved in a sacking is just so bizarre too. Generally don't agree that the sporting culture of a country is representative of the culture of a country, but only England could manage to ostracise their best batsman because he is tough to get on with and who does things his own way and wants to get paid.

And after reading and re-reading it it sounds more and more like PR spin or to put it bluntly BS. A leak to keep the punters happy while the ECB continue to say they can't reveal the reasons for his sacking.

KP scapegoat? Pah! Flower got sacked first, despite presiding over the most successful period in english cricket ever. I think it should be remembered that KP is short on form, and has not really hit the heady heights for some time, he is also now long on age. He has clearly long been a disruptive influence which has only been tolerated because of his performance level, now also because of it patience has run out.

@ Ryan O'Connell : "" The real reason KP was sacked: He told 'headmaster' Flower not to treat players like they were kids after Melbourne debacle By Charles Sale PUBLISHED: 00:40 GMT, 6 February 2014 A players’ meeting called after the fourth successive Ashes defeat emerged on Wednesday as the pivotal event leading to Kevin Pietersen becoming an England outcast. The summit in Melbourne — without team management present — was the idea of Matt Prior, the England vice-captain who had been dropped after the Ashes were lost in Perth. Prior, who regards the England team ethic as all-important, still wanted an opportunity for the players to discuss without fear of recrimination how they could improve dressing-room morale and the team environment. The consensus within the squad was that England team director Andy Flower had been too much of a ‘headmaster figure’ during the tour and needed to relax his iron grip to get the best out of the team. It was after the meeting following the Boxing Day Test defeat that Pietersen, rather than captain Alastair Cook, took it on himself to tell Flower where the players felt he was going wrong. The ECB have refused to clarify the details of the fallout because of legal complications, including confidentially clauses in the Pietersen settlement. But this version of events from inside the dressing room tallies with that of the Pietersen camp, who maintain that their man was the only player prepared to tell Flower some home truths. It also brings some context to the explosive tweets on Wednesday by broadcaster Piers Morgan, KP’s flag-waver-in-chief, who claimed Prior told his team-mates at the summit that Flower was ‘behaving like a headmaster’ and that they were playing in a ‘schoolboy environment’. According to Morgan, Prior added: ‘F*** Flower, this is our team.’ Morgan further tweeted, after challenging Prior to take legal action if the accusations were incorrect: ‘You stabbed Pietersen in the back, yet you agreed with him re Flower’s dictator style. Makes you a flaming hypocrite. ‘For the record, @MattPrior13 (Prior) led the England team meeting after Melbourne Test. And slaughtered Flower.’ Prior responded: ‘I don’t do this PR, spinning media rubbish, but I refuse to be attacked by a bloke that knows very little about what goes on in the England set-up apart from rumour, gossip and hearsay from certain individuals. ‘I’m not the kind of person to divulge what is said in team meetings, but all I will say is that Flower, Cook and the rest of my team-mates know exactly what I said and the way it was meant.’ Ironically, Prior had acted as peacemaker when Pietersen was left out of the England team in 2012 following a number of issues over his contract. But the wicketkeeper continued his attack on Morgan by saying: ‘There is no story here, just an attempt to knock someone who has only ever had the team’s best interests at heart and tried my best on and off the field to help the England cricket team. ‘I can hold my head up high in that knowledge!’ ""

After much googling the most it appears he said was "Strauss is a bit of a douche" (only in Afrikaans) and who hasn't thought that at some time?

and "a fish rots from the head"

P.S. Who here doesn't think Strauss was a bit of a doos? (3.1 Pronunciation; 3.2 Etymology; 3.3 Noun. English[edit]. Etymology[edit]. Afrikaans doos; cognate with Dutch doos; related to dusche, douche; Germanic origin)