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SIMON BARNES
Former chief sportswriter of the Times and the author of more than 20 books
March 10, 2015

The curse of KP
SIMON BARNES

193

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That England can't play one-day cricket very well is old news; the
real problem is that right now they can't play any kind of cricket
11Kshares193

What does
this man have to do with England's World Cup debacle? Getty
Images
There will be a great deal of analysis of England's
performance at the World Cup and their consequent
failure to reach the knockout stage after
their defeat by Bangladesh. Most of it will be
concerned with England's traditional shortcomings
in 50-over cricket.
People will point out that England are hopelessly
out of date, still stuck in the approach they used
when they played ODIs with a red ball - and it was a
bit rusty then. They will talk about Joe Root and Ian
Bell scoring 24 runs off 38 balls as a classic example
of this fuddy-duddiness, and they will be right.
They will speak about English snobbery, the
hierarchical way they view the various forms of
cricket, with ODIs as the poor relation to Test
cricket - even though this overlooks the fact that
over the last 18 months England have been almost
equally poor in Test matches.

That's not a cheap shot. England's limitations in

limited-overs cricket don't matter. The real issue is
that the team is broken. Broken in all the forms in
which it appears. Shattered. Traumatised. Wrecked.
Destroyed. And apparently incapable of healing
itself.
The problems with 50-over cricket are what
scientists would call the proximate cause of this
disaster. If England want to set things aright, they
must look to the ultimate cause.
That means checking out the Curse of the Bambino.
This is a baseball story: it tells of the problems that
affected the Boston Red Sox after they traded Babe
Ruth to the New York Yankees. They failed to win
the World Series again until 2004: a barren patch of
86 years.
England are suffering from the Curse of KP: and
nearly a year after his sacking the team in all its
forms is worse off than ever. Against Bangladesh the
two witless run-outs, the wading-through-treacle
batting, and the tendency for wickets to fall in
clusters showed a deeper malaise than their
inability to get their heads around a different format
of cricket.
How did it begin? I watched England when they
were - briefly - at the very peak of the Test match
rankings. I watched them destroy Australia in
Australia, I watched them hammer India in India,
and in both these efforts, Kevin Pietersen was at
the heart of it.

England are the team that died of a joke. It's a fact

that tyrants and other kinds of egomaniac hate
jokes. They don't understand them - apart from
someone slipping on a banana skin and breaking his
neck. It follows that jokes are often the most
powerful weapons against such people.
The parody Twitter account KPGenius caused deep
pain to Pietersen. It follows that it gave deep delight
to people in the England team who found Pietersen
difficult to deal with. The subversive giggling
created a deep fissure through the team. When you
have such a geology it doesn't take much to create a
major landslide.
And that's what happened when England went to
Australia in 2013 still fancying themselves a great
cricket team. Mitchell Johnson's ferocious bowling
acted like a ton of dynamite on that fault line and
the team collapsed. A team of talented players found
that they could do no right. It was a tour punctuated
by the departure of cricketers who could take no
more, and it was followed by that of coaches who
felt the same.
This was bad enough, but in seeking a cure, England
made it far worse. They made a great to-do of
sacking Pietersen and setting up his beleaguered
captain, Alastair Cook, as a moral rallying point
for an England relaunch. This role was too much for
Cook and the traumatised team he was leading.

England are the team that died of a joke. It's a fact that tyrants and
other kinds of egomaniac hate jokes. It follows that jokes are often
the most powerful weapons against such people
Cook's own form fell away and he was replaced as
one-day captain just before the World Cup. They
brought in Eoin Morgan instead - not a bad plan,
except that Morgan can't buy a run himself, looks
like a busted flush in all forms of cricket, and in the
decisive match against Bangladesh was out third
ball for nought.
All this after England had shunted the Ashes series
around - itself a disastrous decision - to give
themselves a full winter of white-ball cricket to get
ready for this tournament. And just to add another
pint of bat's blood to this witch's brew, the incoming
chairman of the England and Wales Cricket Board,
Colin Graves, has just suggested that there was a
way open for Pietersen's return.
Either Graves is stupid or he is deliberately
destabilising Cook, Paul Downton, chief exec of the
ECB, and the head coach, Peter Moores, all at once.
No other interpretation is possible. Certainly it did a
grand job of upsetting an already troubled team on
the eve of the crucial match of the World Cup.
So the Curse of KP continues. The result is a team in
mental paralysis. I remember Steve Davis, the great
snooker player, telling me: "It's all right to miss a
ball. You're entitled to miss a ball. It's when you
start thinking wrong that you're in trouble."

And that's England. They have been thinking wrong

ever since Johnson dynamited the fissure and
caused England's collapse. The executive, the
coaches, the captains, the players: all incapable of
thinking straight in the desperately difficult times
that began with defeat at the hands of Australia and
continue to this day.
England can't play one-day cricket very well, but
that's old news. The real problem is that right now
they can't play any kind of cricket. I know they beat
India in the Test matches last summer, but India,
notoriously poor travellers, went out of their way to
help them.
This defeat by Bangladesh, this untimely and
undignified exit from the World Cup is not a new
problem, nor is it a pure cricketing matter. It's the
logical result of trauma. Bangladesh were good
enough to prey on England's weakness and doubt,
and take a famous victory.
The Curse of KP strikes again. Never mind, perhaps
England will win the World Cup in 86 years' time.
Simon Barnes is a former chief sportswriter of the Times and the author of
more than 20 books
ESPN Sports Media Ltd.

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LATEST
ALL 193
OLDEST
BRADMANBESTEVER ON MARCH 16, 2015, 3:14 GMT

England's test cricket problems are hard wired into their player's
psyche. Hence the equilibrium condition is for them to lose when the
going is tough.

ON MARCH 15, 2015, 21:15 GMT

Are England really that bad in Test matches? Despite the SL loss, I
don't think we're that bad...Trott, Cook, Ballance, Root, Bell, Ali,
Buttler, Woakes, Broad, Anderson, Finn/Stokes/Plunkett/Reilly really
isn't too shoddy...we will see how they measure against Oz. Yeah
there needs to be big changes in the shorter format for sure...we
need to find a decent spinner from somewhere to provide support to
Ali, we need to get our best players actually playing limited overs
cricket and there needs to be a T20 feel to our one day team. All big
changes but not impossible in 4 years... there's a few waiting in the
wings to step up and show their attacking intent (Roy, Stokes,
Billings to name a few). At present KP would get into no England
team...

MONTE-D ON MARCH 13, 2015, 1:03 GMT

I have always admired Simon Barnes writing. He is an old fashioned

journalist in so far that he writes as friend to sport and as a friend to
the professionals who play. He writes of the joy and traditions of
sport still with the enthusiasm we all had as boys. There is
something of Neville Cardus, John Arlott, or Frank Keating about his
work ...

So it's all the more hard hitting when SB is so critical English Cricket.
SB's sadness and disappointment about our game (and his love for
it) is almost tangible in the article. It is not an article trying to be
clever or sensational. I truly hope that enough people at the ECB
take note.

MISSCRICKET2014 ON MARCH 12, 2015, 23:40 GMT

What we should do instead is that just back them when its hard
time, praise them when they win for you. Its not life and death
mattter. You want some entertainment.. even there is entertainment
in loosing too. Ever fan wants his/her team should win the world cup,
but sadly only two teams play the final and there is going to be only
one winner. Lets play like gentlemen do. Dont be scared of loosing..
Its part of the game. one is looser the other is winner. And its well
known fact that, on a given day only the team which plays better
wins the game. I hope many critics must have got the point here...
Cheers!

MISSCRICKET2014 ON MARCH 12, 2015, 23:40 GMT

I only see one problem... this is the same thing happened with
Austrlia when Pakistan punished them. This is the same thing
happened to india when Austrlia punished them... Its the same thing
that happened to Australia when England punished them a couple
years ago.... From all these incidents happening every now and then
is because of a team's overall selfbelief and over reacting on losses
or wins... I mean, if the players just keep it simple. work on their
weaknesses and improve their strengthst hey can surge like what
Ireland and New Zealand did... Even Australia were very poor in form
but they revived so quickly after badly hammered by Pakistan in
UAE. Anyways, I see the thinktank and the fans heavily criticize their
respective teams. What I think they should take it as a game just for
entertainment. why making it so painful for the players when they
loose? A fear of loosing is something that can easily demoralize
even a entire team.

ON MARCH 12, 2015, 13:36 GMT

And why is England in the Uber 3 again ?, Ireland is doing better

than them for gods sakes. They can't play ODI's, T20I or Tests, chuck
them into associates maybe then they will learn that founding a
sport does not necessarily mean they deserve a top spot.

ON MARCH 12, 2015, 9:49 GMT

I endorse Vinayak Uttarkar views, Yes, England should promote Joe

Root as captain and rebuild a special team for 50 over match and
20:20.

SOHAILH ON MARCH 12, 2015, 9:07 GMT

England is really in need of a class act like Nasir Jamshed. They

should immediately give him England nationality and make him
English team Captain. After that every thing will be fine for England
Cricket Team.

ON MARCH 12, 2015, 4:47 GMT

As a cricket fan, and also a Boston Red Sox fan (I grew up in Boston
during some of the lean years), I understand exactly what you are
saying in this piece. I will add also, that at the time of the sale, the
Boston Red Sox had won five of the first fifteen World Series played,
and the New York Yankees had won zero. After the sale the numbers
were reversed - New York Yankees 27, Boston Red Sox zero. I believe
in The Curse! That being said, now we can continue the countdown
from 86 to zero...

ON MARCH 11, 2015, 19:19 GMT

The wounds of England are self inflicted.Its not KP who caused their
downfall but it was English thinktank which concentrated less on
improving their team but on exploiting weaknesses of their potential
opponents.Whenever they were losing a test/ODI series, they would
create a controversy and media would be happy to partner with
English thinktank to exploit opposition and fabricated
controversies.For example,when Wasim/Waqar were bowling at their
best and using reverse swing, media with the help of English board
created a storm in the frying pan that they were getting this swing

with ball tampering. Later in 2010 when Mohammad Amir/Asif made

Aussie/English batman's life miserable,they fabricated a plan to trap
them in a controversy again with the help of English media. Instead
of improving their battin technique, in W's as well as in Mohammad's
time, they concentrated on negative tactics, that is now coming
back to them, so take it and face it England.

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KP: The AutobiographyOctober 6, 2014

KP reveals how career ended

ANDREW MCGLASHAN

49

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Play01:01
Pietersen attacks Flower, Prior

Paul Downton viewed Kevin Pietersen's shot in Melbourne as reckless

Getty Images

Kevin Pietersen's final days as an England player

were dominated by hotel-room meetings, dismissive
glances, brooding resentment and mistrust and
finally open-mouth shock as he listened to the
explanations for his sacking given to him by the ECB
hierarchy.
The final straw in his fractured relationship
with Andy Flower came on the eve of the final
Ashes Test in Sydney when Flower summoned
Pietersen to his room to ask about the player's
rubbishing of him during an outspoken team
meeting which had been convened, without the
support staff, following the defeat in Melbourne.
In his autobiography which is published by Sphere
on Thursday, Pietersen says that he was made out to
be the major back-stabber during the Melbourne
meeting and writes that it was Matt Prior, another
with who the relationship had fallen apart, who said
"f**k Flower this is not his team" and that he was
just reiterating condemnation of Flower's intense
approach he had been making for two years.
Pietersen was also angered by the fact Prior, whose
assertive role as vice captain often compensated for
Alastair Cook's reticence as captain, was so central
to the meeting despite being dropped.
He calls the decision to put the emphasis on fitness
levels between the fourth and fifth Test "insane" and
"a move right out of the Flower playbook" and
explains how he pulled Cook aside to tell him he was
wrong. "We needed to be reminded that, somewhere

lost in the middle of the all the shit, we were a

decent team with some decent cricketers."
Pietersen admits that during that meeting he "got
into a huge argument" with Flower who told
Pietersen "you really disappoint me." He slams
Flower's talk of building a legacy which had been
used in the build-up to the tour. "He had thought
that by hinting that he was finished his team would
say, oh noInstead guys just thought, hey, this
f****r is bailing out and he needs us to make him
look good."
As Pietersen was leaving the room, he tells that
Flower said to him that he hoped he scored some
runs in the Test. "That lodged in my headActually
I get what you are saying. I get the veiled threat, so
why don't you just f**k off, Flower?"
Shortly after the Sydney Test finished, inside three
days, the rumours of Pietersen's future started
circulating. "From the moment I left Flower's room
in Sydney, I had a sense that the inner circle were
telling each other that they had to find some way to
get rid of me."
A little over a month later, in another hotel room,
this time across the road from Lord's, he had his
international career ended by Paul Downton, the
new managing director of England cricket, who as
Pietersen discovered on a Google search "was a
lower-order middle-order batsman with a Test
average of 20."

Downton explained his decision by saying he had

never seen anyone so "disengaged" from the team as
he witnessed over the three days of the Sydney Test.
In his autobiography, Pietersen writes that he felt
was a pre-ordained decision to end his career.
"He's been forced to admit there was no smoking
gun. The only charge seems to be that Paul
Downton, watching his very first Test in his brandnew job, opted to study me exclusively and
concluded that I looked 'disengaged'I would love
to know how any cricketer facing Aussie bowlers on
their home turf could look 'disinterested'.
"Or does it have nothing to do with my batting? Is
Downton claiming that he was watching me when I
was in the outfield? Why would he do that, if not in
order to gather evidence to strengthen a case that
somebody must have already made to him?"
He questioned why Flower, with whom Pietersen's
relationship had reached rock-bottom, was not
asked "what the hell was going on". "They knew the
truthThey knew that a clique choked our team,
and that Andy Flower let that clique grow like a bad
weed."
Pietersen claims the ECB needed a scapegoat who
was "big, boisterous and annoyingsomebody who
left colourful footprints on the pristine white
carpets."
Pietersen reveals he had two meetings with
Downton - one at Lord's before the ECB hired a

suite to deliver their final judgement. "I am glad

that we are doing this in a hotel," he writes of his
thoughts on the day. "As I walked past all the desks
in the ECB offices for my first meeting with
Downton a few days ago, I felt like the school
troublemaker on his way to the headmaster's office."
That first meeting had left Pietersen shocked at
Downton's response to his self-assessment of his
performance in the Ashes. "Look, I said, I didn't bat
well as I could. I did okay," Pietersen recalls was his
comment in the meeting to which he says "Downton
said he had seen the way I had played - I hadn't
battled well. Careless. Really? I looked at him, my
mouth hanging open."
Pietersen went onto ask Downton if he had watched
the Melbourne Test, where he scored 71 in the first
innings, but Downton said he had been flying. "No,
he went on, but he saw the way I got out. Reckless. I
just said, wow."
The first conversation with Downton finished with
Pietersen being asked what his ambitions for the
future were and he picked out the 10,000-run target
which has been his oft-stated aim. Pietersen says the
response from Downton was "I would have
preferred you to have said, I would like to help
England win matches."
When Pietersen found out the second meeting
would also include James Whitaker, the national
selector, and Cook he was not optimistic. "I know,
though, that while Cooky is a nice man, he is also a

company man. A safe pair of hands; he won't rock

the boat."
Downton then told Pietersen of the decision that
"you are not going to be part of the process going
forward" to which he asked "Right. So you are
sacking me?" before an exchange followed where
neither Whitaker or Downton appeared to want to
confirm the finality of the news. "Silence," Pietersen
writes, "Whitaker nodding, Cook still looking at
something really fascinating on his shoe."
Pietersen left and met Adam Wheatley, his agent, in
the lobby and went to visit his lawyer. "We began
making arrangements for severance. It was over.
That was all I could think. Over."
Pietersen admits he made some mistakes and
remarkably still holds out hope of a comeback. "I
didn't always tread wisely. I was often nave and
sometimes stupid. I was no villain, though.
"Cricket is politics. Bad politics. Things change
overnight. I believe that the governing body of
English cricket could change; I believe it should
change. I am happy for now, but I would be happy
to come back. Anything can happen in cricket."
Andrew McGlashan is a senior assistant editor at ESPNcricinfo
ESPN Sports Media Ltd.

Comments have now been closed for this article

LATEST
ALL 49

OLDEST
JG2704 ON OCTOBER 8, 2014, 20:37 GMT

@bundybear55 on (October 6, 2014, 22:55 GMT) It would indeed be

interesting to see what would have happened if KP had still been playing
under Vaughan all these years. Vaughan was an attacking captain and
maybe KP could have flourished even more under Vaughan and he may have
kept his head off field. I wonder if the reason why KP has been more inhibited
is because he has tried to modify his game to suit others? It hasn't worked

JG2704 ON OCTOBER 8, 2014, 20:36 GMT

@ JaranNirsi on (October 6, 2014, 19:49 GMT) Just a couple of points here. He

didn't beat the interested rest hands down in Oz. He was better than most
but there were 5 or 6 bats