The new England and Wales Cricket Board chairman, Colin Graves, has denied misleading Kevin Pietersen over his prospects for an international recall, angrily accusing critics of calling his integrity into question.
Graves set the hares running on Pietersen’s possible return to the England fold in March when he said that selectors could not ignore him if he returned to county cricket and scored lots of runs.
In a blog on the ECB website to mark his first official day in the job, Graves said that he was “saddened” that his integrity had been called into question by the suggestion he had misled Pietersen and that he wanted to set the record straight over a phone conversation they had in March. “I didn’t make any promises. There were no guarantees that if he chose to exit his IPL contract, play county cricket and score runs he would be selected for England,” Graves said. “And I said he should make any decision on his future on that basis. I can see something has been misunderstood around the conversation and in the following debate – and perhaps how that happened.”
In March, Graves told the BBC that Pietersen would have to be scoring runs in county cricket to be even considered for an England recall. He then told the Telegraph if Pietersen returned to England he would have to be considered. “If he does that and then comes out and scores a lot of runs they can’t ignore him, I would have thought, but that is up to him. You can’t pick someone when he is not playing,” he said.
After being told on Wednesday by England’s new director of cricket, Andrew Strauss, that there was no way back into the international side this summer because of unresolved trust issues, Pietersen said: “I just find it incredibly deceitful what has happened to me and am frankly finding it difficult to understand right now. I have done everything I have been asked. I keep asking myself, what more could I do?”
But Graves, the Yorkshire chairman who officially took over from Giles Clarke at Thursday’s ECB annual general meeting, said Pietersen was never given any guarantees. “Ahead of a big, busy summer of cricket, a clear decision needed to be taken. Given the history and the book, the simple fact is that bridges have still not been rebuilt and trust needs to be restored,” he said. “That takes time – as Andrew Strauss made clear this week.” Like Strauss, Graves insisted that Pietersen could yet return in an ECB role at some point in the future – however remote that possibility now appears. “Despite everything, he can work with us to re-build the relationship and make a further contribution to English cricket. It was important he knew where he stood.”
The 34-year-old is having treatment on an injury sustained in scoring a personal best 355 not out for Surrey this week and is considering his future plans.
Meanwhile, an expected statement from ECB president Giles Clarke on the subject of a mooted “rebel” breakaway form of the game backed by Indian conglomerate Essel has been pushed back to next week due to the Pietersen fallout.
