Left field

Does sporting immortality still beckon for Pietersen?

A casual remark from Pakistan fast bowler Wahab Riaz last week illustrated how swiftly life moves on in elite sport.

Riaz was asked which of the five England wickets he had captured in his test debut at the Oval had given him the most satisfaction.

The answer was not Kevin Pietersen, England’s premier batsman with more than 5,000 test runs and 16 centuries. Instead Riaz nominated Eoin Morgan, scorer of 234 runs with one century.

Even six months ago such a statement would have seemed inconceivable.

One transcendent innings at Lord’s in the final test against Pakistan this week would silence the doubters but something is clearly something amiss with Pietersen, who has not scored a test century since March last year. He dropped out of the 2009 Ashes series with injury and averages 28 in the current series against Pakistan, including 80 at Edgbaston where he was dropped three times.

The decline dates back to the start of last year when Pietersen, then the England captain, called for the removal of coach Peter Moores before a series in the Caribbean. Moores did go but Pietersen, misreading the implications of his stance in a highly political role, also lost his job.

Pietersen is currently without a county, finding the demands of playing for Hampshire incompatible with his decision to live in the upmarket west London suburb of Chelsea. It is an instability that has marked his cricket career.

How will Pietersen absence affect England?

England batsman Kevin Pietersen has been ruled out of the Ashes series after undergoing surgery for an ongoing Achilles tendon injury.

ECB Chief Medical Officer, Nick Peirce, said: “The operation involved a small incision and trimming of the blood vessels and nerves around the inflamed tendon and appears, at this early stage, to have been routine.

“Kevin will look to undertake a comprehensive rehabilitation programme to ensure there is no risk of recurrence. This is expected to be approximately six weeks but will be taken at an appropriate pace following constant review.”

How will this affect England’s chances given they were on a high from winning at Lord’s? 

PHOTO: England’s Kevin Pietersen sits on the dressing room balcony at Lord’s after England’s victory against Australia in the second Ashes test at Lord’s, London July 20, 2009. REUTERS/Philip Brown

Feeble England still can’t get to grips with Twenty20

England may argue that they were unlucky to exit the World Twenty20 following a five-wicket defeat by West Indies but the simple truth is that they batted poorly throughout the tournament.

With the honourable exceptions of Ravi Bopara and Kevin Pietersen, the batsmen completely failed to get to grips with the art of scoring runs in this form of the game.

Call it lack of urgency, lack of innovation or lack of skill but the main problems were a shortage of power and the confidence to take calculated risks.

Dmitri Mascarenhas’s bizarre innings against India summed up England’s problem. The burly all-rounder has proved that he is capable of hitting sixes at international level. After a steady start to the innings against India he was promoted up the order to number four, specifically to take on the Indian slow bowlers and boost the run rate with a few lusty blows. Or so we thought.

Instead, Mascarenhas paddled the ball aimlessly around for ones and twos, facing 27 balls for his 25 runs. Far from actually clearing the ropes, he did not even once attempt a big hit. Momentum lost, Owais Shah, Paul Collingwood and James Foster, all far more suited to the type of supporting innings Mascarenhas was playing, perished trying to find the boundaries England so desperately needed.

Against India, England’s bowlers performed heroically to pull off an unlikely victory but 24 hours later the tournament hosts found themselves in a similar position against West Indies. A solid platform laid by Bopara and Pietersen simply cried out for sensible attacking batting to lift England to a formidable total. But England went some 50 balls without hitting a single boundary until Stuart Broad hit the last two deliveries of the innings for six and four. Again, England finished at least 20 runs short of a challenging total and West Indies took full advantage.

Twenty20 is about entertainment, not the result

If the result of a cricket one-day international is forgotten by most fans within a week the shelf life of Twenty20 memories must be measured in Mayfly proportions.

However, that does not mean that there is no value in the smash and crash of cricket’s newest format. Quite the opposite.

England all-rounder Kevin Pietersen, one of the most explosive and inventive batsmen in the game, greeted the first edition of the world Twenty20 by describing his efforts as “silly shots for a silly game”.

As he prepares for the second, having yet to master a format that would appear tailor-made for him, he says he is taking it very seriously.

A close-up view of the IPL, where he was jointly rated as the most valuable commodity in the game alongside Andrew Flintoff, and the realisation that international trophies are few and far between, have combined to focus Pietersen’s mind.

For most fans, however, one-day cricket and particularly the 20 overs-a-side version, is still more about having a day out and marvelling at the hitting power of the game’s top batsmen.

IPL can succeed in South Africa

It’s a busy time in the cricket world. Pakistan has been told it can’t host matches in the 2011 World Cup while the second edition of the Indian Premier League, this time being played in South Africa, starts on Saturday.

IPL fans are preparing themselves for what should be 59 scintillating Twenty20 matches, played at a frantic pace by the very best players in the world.

The Chennai Super Kings first meet the Mumbai Indians at Newlands in Cape Town, the start of what is expected to be a flamboyant, fun-filled tournament, draped in Bollywood glamour.

The tournament, as the name suggests, should have been hosted in India.

The venue for the competition was switched to South Africa because of concerns over security given the league clashes with the Indian election.

The switch has encountered problems, most notably a dispute between the IPL and suite holders at major stadiums.

New England coach Flower is used to daunting tasks

Andy Flower, appointed England director of cricket on Wednesday, was responsible with Zimbabwe team mate Henry Olonga for a startling and unprecedented protest in his team’s opening 2003 World Cup match.

Flower and Olonga took the field against Namibia in Harare on Feb. 10, 2003, wearing black armbands to “mourn the death of democracy in our beloved Zimbabwe”.

“We cannot in good conscience take to the field and ignore the fact millions of our compatriots are starving, unemployed and oppressed,” the pair said in a joint statement.

Cricket followers had been aware over the previous decade that Flower possessed abundant physical and mental fortitude.

Now he had demonstrated equivalent moral courage in the face of intense pressure from the Zimbabwe authorities who threatened to drop him from the squad if he did not abandon his protest.

They were forced to back down when other senior players said they would not take the field if Flower was omitted.