English Sporting Woes
16.Nov.09
One of the most depressing facts about England's mauling by South Africa in their recent Twenty20 international was that the majority of our runs were also scored by South Africans! Of our 157, 51 were scored by Jonathan Trott and 29 by Kevin Pietersen. If the powers that be have their way there will be another South African in the side before long as the Somerset wicketkeeper-batsman Craig Kieswetter is already in the England Performance Programme despite the fact that he will only become eligible to play for his adopted country in February next year.
Now there is no doubt that Kieswetter is a fine prospect, the fact that the South African skipper Graeme Smith says he wants to bring him back to his native South Africa to play is testament to that. The part that worries me is that apart from a few exceptions like Adil Rashid, we seem to be failing to produce top class players of our own. This is despite the fact that because of the ECB's deal with BSkyB there has never been more money in the game. Sadly much of it seems to be wasted on propping up a largely discredited county system that is full of too many highly paid overseas players and time serving old lags.
It wasn't much fun generally being an England supported over the weekend, especially if you happen to be in Australia. The football game against Brazil showed us what we already knew that while our first XI isn't bad, there's not a lot in the locker to back them up. As for the rugby, there is more entertainment to be had reading the Yellow Pages than anything that was on show at Twickenham. They look like a team who don't have a plan and if they do no one has explained it to them. Testing times for Martin Johnson who would not be the first great player to fail to become a great coach.