A long way to go

Peter Roebuck has a go at the World Cup (like many, many others) and most of it is the usual "Damn-the-ICC-for-their-greed-why-can't-anyone-beat-the-Aussies" stuff. But then tucked away in a little corner, as Roebuck blasts all the teams is this:

England is still in the game but has leant heavily on Kevin Pietersen and its Asian contingent.

Now, last time I checked Monty was born in Luton (Berfordshire), Ravi Bopara was born in London, and Sajid Mahmood was born in Bolton (Lancashire). These guys are Englishmen, born and bred in England. To lump all of them in with Pietersen is pretty depressing. Pietersen left his country of birth, because of some imagined grievance with its selection policies and chose to play for England as a working arrangement. The "Asian contingent" play for the country they know as their own. Its a different matter that some might not have seen them as sufficiently English. And Roebuck shows that that habit has not gone away. Are these three players those that moved to England because they wanted to play somewhere else? No - their parents moved there for the kinds of reasons Pietersen but these gentlemen only know one allegiance. Why aren't they lumped in with the rest of the team? I doubt they appreciate being thought of on the same level as Pietersen (as part of the group of 'foreigners' that play for England?) To their credit, the English crew of commentators have not treated the trio like anyone else in team by not constantly harping on their being "Asian". (Nasser Hussain took it one step further by sounding positively paternal when talking of Bopara in his Essex days).