HOW typical. The England cricket team allowed us barely 24 hours of gloating about the troubles of the Australian side before parading their own chaos to the world.
The Aussies, at least, were beaten by brilliant play from South Africa in losing their first home Test series for nearly two decades.
England sailed into a wreckage all of their own making when a serious and now irreparable breakdown in the relationship between captain Kevin Pietersen and coach Peter Moores was revealed – information, it is safe to say, that was not leaked to the public by Moores.
“Back me or I quit” was the gist of the Pietersen message to the ECB hierarchy at Lord’s. Either Moores goes, or I do.
The tipping point for the England captain with the coach was said to be the non-selection of former skipper Michael Vaughan for the forthcoming tour of the West Indies. My reaction to all this was instant. Go on then – quit.
If the England cricket captain is willing to put one of the great jobs of sport on the line for such a relatively trivial issue, he is surely no great tactician, and he surely doesn’t possess the detached perspective required for the role.
This, truth be told, is hardly one of the great cause celebre selection controversies that litter the history of English cricket.
When, for example, David Gower was omitted from the 1992-3 tour of India there were questions in the House of Commons, and an emergency MCC meeting was convened and a vote taken to fiercely condemn Gower’s non-selection.
The public response to the absence of Vaughan from this tour party has been: So what?
A major reason Pietersen wanted Vaughan in the squad was to lean on the latter’s experience and nous. Well, if Vaughan is to be selected just for his tactical acumen, why not go the whole hog and make him skipper again?
It’s clear enough that Pietersen doesn’t trust the judgement and work of Moores. Nor did Vaughan as captain before him.
I also happen to believe that Moores has been unimpressive in his job, and I argued on this page last summer that the ECB should act swiftly to change the England coach there and then – because the closer we moved towards the 2009 Ashes summer the more risky it would become to make a switch of leadership.
The ECB didn’t do so. And now they are paying the inevitable price. Something has to give this time. They may want to wash away the dirt and wish away the problem, but it’s gone too far for that. Even if Pietersen and Moores could be persuaded to perform a public patch-up job, with forced smiles and a wary handshake for the TV cameras, nobody would believe it was for real.
The bitter truth for Moores is that his authority as coach is now thoroughly undermined unless Pietersen is kicked out of the team altogether.
That won’t happen. But what the ECB must also do, once the departure of Moores has been arranged as honourably as possible, is to stand down Pietersen as the England cricket captain and find a new skipper.
If Pietersen were to remain, having effectively forced the sacking of the coach, how could the England team operate properly?
Crucially, which top-class international coach (and boy, does an under-achieving England team need a top-class international coach) would agree to take on the job where there is a captain who always wants his own way and throws his toys out of the pram if he doesn’t get it?
You cannot run a system in which the captain has a veto on the identity of the coach. It is also wise to have a selection system that is specifically independent – because, firstly, a captain cannot be around to judge every potential player and, secondly, to guard against the risks of indulging personal favouritism.
Pietersen’s way cannot be tolerated. It is a road to ruin. I saw it written last week that “it would be dangerous to call Pietersen’s bluff because he is not all-consumed by the captaincy and is prepared to go back to the ranks and concentrate solely on scoring runs”.
Actually, the clear and present danger for the ECB lies in not sending Pietersen back to the ranks. Do we really want an England captain who doesn’t think the job is all-consuming in an Ashes year?
The best way forward from the current chaos is to have a new England regime – a new captain and a new coach. Andrew Strauss was always the logical choice as the Test skipper, and could be installed immediately.
A credible replacement coach will almost certainly take longer to find than the next three weeks before the West Indies tour begins. But batting supremo Andy Flower could do the job on an interim basis, while Hugh Morris, the managing director of England cricket, was given overall charge of tour discipline and management.
It may not be ideal to start afresh so close to an Ashes summer.
But when you’re shipwrecked, the first thing you do is jump in a lifeboat and start paddling.
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