Jonathan Trott was born in South Africa.
So were Andrew Strauss and Matt Prior.
Throw in Kevin Pietersen and that’s 1/4 of the 16 players England have called up this summer who were born Saffers.
I don’t have a problem with this. England has a proud tradition of utilising players from the former colonies. Heck, some of them – Dexter, Grieg, Lamb (once) and two of the above have gone on to captain the side.
My problem is that we’re clearly missing a trick. None of these have produced offspring who were also born abroad (preferably in SA). This shows a serious lack of forward planning by the ECB. Hell, Strauss was even allowed to return home from a tour to be with his wife whilst she gave birth. In England. What the ECB should’ve done was to ship her out to Jo’burg at 24 weeks, then confine her there until after the big squeeze.
They made the same mistake with Mrs Prior, too, which just shows what a bunch of braindeads they are.
KP has to be next in the frame. He’s got a few weeks where he can’t really do anything but put his feet up and he’s known to enjoy spending extra time with Jessica. If Geoff Miller hasn’t stuck the pair of them on a plane to Durban by now, he should be penning his resignation letter first thing in the morning. The future of English cricket demands nothing less.
