In fight turbulence-Eng Dressing Room not a happy place: Ian Botham

In-fight turbulence
Dressing room clearly not a happy place, says Beefy

"If you watch from afar it doesn't look a happy side," said Beefy. "They are at each other's throats; there is all sorts going on. There were niggles at the end of play here tonight.

"I don't know what that is but you cannot keep ignoring that, there is something going on; someone needs to sort that out because that is definitely having an effect.

"Throughout this series we have seen too much of that. If you've got things to sort out do it in the dressing room man-to-man and get the thing sorted out, not out in the field.

"I was disappointed to see that kind of performance; you should be man enough to sort it out in the dressing room and if you have a problem with a member of the opposition again, go into the dressing room and sort it out. It is the only way the air gets cleared. It was quite ugly here at times and unnecessary.

"To be honest, when you hear some of the things we hear from the stump mics it is pretty pathetic, to be quite honest

I do think that something has happened in the dressing room and I think that Graeme Swann was left out [in Mumbai]. They won't admit it. It will come out in the wash eventually but something went on.

"What is this writing a book when you are still playing? When we were contracted you could not write a book - how can you write an autobiography when you are still playing? You shouldn't do it. It can only go one way - it can only cause problems.

"If you've got something to say, you've got plenty of time to say it when you are long retired."

Beefy pointed the finger of blame at the batsmen and their inability to adapt an overly-rigid game-plan.

"We're World No 1 in the Test rankings, we're world No 1 in the T20 rankings - so in between how do we go so horribly wrong?" he asked.

"You can come out with 'we picked some positives up out of this' but that's baloney, absolute baloney. You've been trounced and it has been embarrassing.

"If I'm going to be really honest we're just not good enough; we don't seem to learn; we don't realise you can knock the balls; we only seem to try to deal in fours and sixes - occasionally - or dot balls.

"If you watch the Indian players they let the ball come on, they knock it into the holes, they run; everything we do is hard and rigid. It is like throw-downs - punch, punch, punch - whereas you'll see the other players like Ghambir, Dhoni just turn it into the little areas and keep the board ticking over.

"We haven't learned. The spinners come on and we do the basics wrong. If the ball is turning away from us we don't want to be trying to hit it over midwicket; you want to be going with it a bit more. It's almost like a rabbit caught in the lights. We just don't know.

"England have to have a re-think and start thinking on their feet against the opposition, according to what the ball is doing on the surface at that time. At the moment we are all hell bent on one thing, we are very, very stereo-typed and predictable and very easy to set fields for."

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Leff wrote:It's never appropriate to make demeaning and derogatory comments at a current teammate. As fans, we can say many things and such comments could come from the media, but it's definitely inappropriate for players to do so.

This kind of behaviour is a way of life for Pakstan cricketers, but rather unusual for the England team.

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:Flipping this around though doesnt it show why the England mamangement were right to previously exclude Fatel from teh squad?
The strength of Englnad recently has been partly down to assembling a team of decicated indivuals who are part of a close knit team working ofr each other.
Adding in someone who is fat lazy and useless has upset that, and wound up the harder working players.

rich1uk wrote:shanks have you seen any actual comments or just going by rumours on message boards ?

JDizzle wrote:I think Swann may have been told off for those comments. He was "rested" for the fourth game of the series remember. After hearing these comments I suspect it may have been Andy Flower's way of putting the hammer down.

shankythebiggestengfan wrote:

rich1uk wrote:shanks have you seen any actual comments or just going by rumours on message boards ?

Thats what I have heard.

shankythebiggestengfan wrote:

JDizzle wrote:I think Swann may have been told off for those comments. He was "rested" for the fourth game of the series remember. After hearing these comments I suspect it may have been Andy Flower's way of putting the hammer down.

Vaughan says he was dropped.

rich1uk wrote:

shankythebiggestengfan wrote:

JDizzle wrote:I think Swann may have been told off for those comments. He was "rested" for the fourth game of the series remember. After hearing these comments I suspect it may have been Andy Flower's way of putting the hammer down.

Vaughan says he was dropped.

and michael vaughan has been a reliable source of information and never tried to sensationalise stuff since he became a pundit ?

rich1uk wrote:if swann was dropped for the 4th game it wouldn't have been because of comments made to patel tbh , if he was adjudged to have been out of order he would have been sent home imo

i think he had just lost the plot in general after the first three games rather than anything specific about patel and needed a game off just to try and get his head straight again

if you start of with a guess and then extrapolate based on that guess then you are only more likely to get further from the truth than closer .