Andrew Strauss confident Kevin Pietersen will not retire
English captain Andrew Strauss has confirmed that star middle-order batsman Kevin Pietersen will not retire from One Day Internationals after the ICC World Cup 2011.
Strauss stated that the stylish batsman had personally talked to him and denied the rumours.
As the Poms are in the Subcontinent for cricket’s mega event which starts from 19 February, there was a rumour which shocked the English fans. There were many reports in the press that Pietersen will not be a part of the 50-over team after the World Cup
ends.
However, Strauss was confident that the flamboyant batsman will continue to represent England in all forms of the game.
Strauss admitted that there is a lot of workload on the players these days, which forces them to consider quitting one of the formats of the game in order to elongate their careers.
The English captain himself has quit the Twenty20 format to focus more on the longer versions of the game. He featured in just four Twenty20 internationals before deciding to quit from the shortest version of the game.
Apart from Strauss, many other players have quit the Twenty20 format in order to cut down on their heavy schedules. The most recent example is of Michael Clarke, who was the captain of the Australian Twenty20 team before he decided to quit the format and
focus on longer formats of the game.
However, some players do the opposite to http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Clarke-c51120 and Strauss and quit either Tests or ODIs in order to elongate their careers and play international cricket.
England’s all-rounder Paul Collingwood retired from Test cricket in January 2011 in order to focus more on the limited-over formats. He was the captain of England’s Twenty20 World Cup winning side in 2010.
Even though the veteran player has been out of form for the past few months, Strauss believes that Collingwood can play a vital role in helping http://www.senore.com/Cricket/England-c749 to lift the 50-over World Cup for the first time in their history.
Strauss said that Collingwood’s all-round ability will be beneficial for the team in the mega event. Apart from his batting, he is one of the best fielders amongst all teams and his bowling will be more than useful in the Subcontinent conditions.
England will certainly need the experience of players like Collingwood and Pietersen in the World Cup especially in the absence of a match winner like Eoin Morgan, who was ruled out of the event following a finger injury.
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