ECB protects Trescothick
Good strategy by ECB. Needless Ganguly-style controversey does not help.
CricketShot.Net applauds ECB!
The Times April 12, 2006
ECB refuses to allow Trescothick to speak for himself
By Ivo Tennant
MARCUS TRESCOTHICK’S countenance was at one with the West Country weather yesterday — slate grey. County cricket press days are customarily jolly affairs, with smiles and bonhomie and handshakes all round after a long winter. It is unprecedented for an England cricketer to appear with an ECB minder and not even to exchange pleasantries with reporters, some of whom, down the years, have shared his favourite bangers with him.
About 25 journalists, at least two of whom are friends of Trescothick, pitched up at Taunton for Somerset’s press briefing expecting a chat or an interview and all were repelled. Not by the player but by Colin Gibson, the ECB’s director of communications, heeding the advice of confidants of the England opening batsman, who include Neil Fairbrother, the cricketer turned agent. Only photographs were permitted before he was led away to visit two schools in the area.
Trescothick, indeed, had wanted to talk to old chums: no cricketer enjoys the environment of his county club more than he does. Recently he signed an innovative, rolling contract with Somerset that will come into effect when his Test career is over. The concern is that this will be sooner rather than later.
Absence from his family and tiredness after winning the Ashes has had as much if not more to do with Trescothick’s early departure from the England tour to India as any mysterious virus, although that was not apparent from the transcript of his television interview on Monday. Somerset, for their part, are supportive and at least will have him to themselves at the start of the season.
Trescothick is unlikely to play in a one-day match against Cornwall tomorrow but probably will take part in another pre-season fixture, against a Board XI, on Saturday. He will then play against Gloucestershire in the opening Liverpool Victoria County Championship match of the season in Bristol on Tuesday. The media will be back for that one.
The events of the past two days have illustrated how an essentially relaxed and friendly county club such as Somerset are hamstrung in the sense that Trescothick is not their employee. The ECB controls his every visit to the crease and, after advice from Fairbrother, his every utterance. The upshot is a muddle that would have been best avoided by a straightforward explanation when Trescothick left the tour.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,426-2130169,00.html
Good strategy by ECB. Needless Ganguly-style controversey does not help.
CricketShot.Net applauds ECB!
The Times April 12, 2006
ECB refuses to allow Trescothick to speak for himself
By Ivo Tennant
MARCUS TRESCOTHICK’S countenance was at one with the West Country weather yesterday — slate grey. County cricket press days are customarily jolly affairs, with smiles and bonhomie and handshakes all round after a long winter. It is unprecedented for an England cricketer to appear with an ECB minder and not even to exchange pleasantries with reporters, some of whom, down the years, have shared his favourite bangers with him.
About 25 journalists, at least two of whom are friends of Trescothick, pitched up at Taunton for Somerset’s press briefing expecting a chat or an interview and all were repelled. Not by the player but by Colin Gibson, the ECB’s director of communications, heeding the advice of confidants of the England opening batsman, who include Neil Fairbrother, the cricketer turned agent. Only photographs were permitted before he was led away to visit two schools in the area.
Trescothick, indeed, had wanted to talk to old chums: no cricketer enjoys the environment of his county club more than he does. Recently he signed an innovative, rolling contract with Somerset that will come into effect when his Test career is over. The concern is that this will be sooner rather than later.
Absence from his family and tiredness after winning the Ashes has had as much if not more to do with Trescothick’s early departure from the England tour to India as any mysterious virus, although that was not apparent from the transcript of his television interview on Monday. Somerset, for their part, are supportive and at least will have him to themselves at the start of the season.
Trescothick is unlikely to play in a one-day match against Cornwall tomorrow but probably will take part in another pre-season fixture, against a Board XI, on Saturday. He will then play against Gloucestershire in the opening Liverpool Victoria County Championship match of the season in Bristol on Tuesday. The media will be back for that one.
The events of the past two days have illustrated how an essentially relaxed and friendly county club such as Somerset are hamstrung in the sense that Trescothick is not their employee. The ECB controls his every visit to the crease and, after advice from Fairbrother, his every utterance. The upshot is a muddle that would have been best avoided by a straightforward explanation when Trescothick left the tour.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,426-2130169,00.html