Kevin Pietersen’s Surrey stint a timely wake-up
Kevin Pietersen is not indispensible.
That’s the message England’s selectors sent to the highly talented but out-of-form batsman when they dropped him from both their Twenty20 and ODI squads to face http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 this month.
It’s not one KP liked, either, if the tweet that briefly appeared on his verified Twitter site yesterday is to be believed.
“Yep...Done for the rest of summer!! Man of the World Cup T20 and dropped from the T20 side too...It’s a f**k up!!” the tweet, posted before the ECB had made the official announcement of his omission read in part.
In the same tweet on the social networking site, Pietersen let slip he’d been signed by county club http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Hampshire-c789 to Surrey for the rest of the season.
Earlier in the summer, Pietersen made the ill-timed decision to announce he was parting ways with Hampshire at the season’s end, and on the occasions he has since been available for selection has been overlooked by the club.
So it’s to struggling Surrey the 30-year-old now heads as he seeks to recapture the match-winning form that has deserted him in recent times, especially at Test level where since his 2009 Ashes series was cut short with an Achilles injury he has failed to impose himself on a match in the manner to which England fans had become accustomed.
“Kevin has proved on numerous occasions that he is a world-class player and we know he’ll benefit from getting more time in the middle to work on his batting and get his game back to the level he has shown throughout his career,” England national selector Geoff Miller said when announcing Pietersen’s omission yesterday.
Until now, England team director Andy Flower and the selectors have been patient with the star batsman and his struggles for form, but that patience always had to have its limits. Now we know what they were.
After the Twitter outburst, Pietersen said through official channels that, “I am grateful to be given the opportunity by Surrey to hopefully score some runs and be part of their team in their remaining games this season.”
Runs are exactly what KP needs right now as he comes to grips with the fact that reputation alone will not warrant his ongoing inclusion in an England side where right now every place in the playing XI is hotly contested.
Even more so, too, with an Ashes defence in http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Australia-c746 looming ever larger on the horizon.
It may not be a message Pietersen wanted to receive, but it might also prove to be just the wake-up call he needed.
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