adminANDREW STRAUSS has apologised for an offensive comment he made about Kevin Pietersen when he thought he was off the air while commentating at Lord’s.
Strauss was heard by Australian Fox Sports viewers calling Pietersen a “cunt” during the MCC v Rest of the World fixture. He was discussing his former England colleague with his fellow commentator Nick Knight in the bluntest of terms, believing — mistakenly — that an advertising break was taking place all around the world. The comments were not heard by Sky viewers in Britain.
The former England captain apologised on air later. “I apologise unreservedly, particularly to Kevin Pietersen,” he said. “I am mortified and profusely sorry.”
Sky Sports had earlier issued its own apology. “Earlier comments were made during a break of play, which were heard overseas. We apologise for the language issued,” it said in a tweet.
Strauss’s apology was rather more wholehearted than the one that Paul Downton was required to give after his comments on BBC radio that Pietersen had been “disengaged” and disinterested” in Australia at the end of the Ashes series.
The episode is the latest in a series of tangled relationships between Pietersen and recent England captains that continue to haunt the game.
In 2012 Pietersen enraged the England hierarchy because of text messages sent about Strauss to South African cricketers engaged in the series in England. Pietersen was subsequently dropped for the final Test of that summer. More recently he was “retired” by England’s new regime, led by Paul Downton.
At Lord’s, where the two teams were playing to celebrate 200 years of cricket on this site, Pietersen could not be consoled by his captain for the day, Shane Warne. He was struck by a beamer from his old Australia team-mate, Brett Lee; his hand was broken and he was therefore unable to lead the Rest of the World side in the field. This will have disappointed him as well as a packed house, eager for one last glimpse of the great leg-spinner.
Meanwhile, Strauss, a man renowned for the safest pair of hands — and a restrained tongue — must have been contemplating whether a media career was quite so attractive after all. — The Guardian
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