? 'This agent hasn't done a proper job,' says Colin Graves
? Kevin Pietersen set to make a rare appearance for Surrey
Yorkshire's chairman, Colin Graves, blamed Mitchell Starc's agent for the "fiasco" that meant exactly a week after informing one international fast bowler that he was free to leave, the county had another deported.
Starc, a 22-year-old from Sydney who has played four Tests for Australia, had been due to start a five-week stint with Yorkshire in their County Championship match against Gloucestershire at Bristol on Wednesday, helping to fill the gap left by Ajmal Shahzad's departure to Lancashire.
Instead he suffered the indignity of being sent home from Heathrow, after being detained for more than four hours. "Well that's a first!" Starc tweeted. "Being deported from England. Surely nothing else can go wrong can it?!?! �ffsake!"
However, Graves suggested that instead of blaming Cricket Australia or the inflexibility of the UK Border Agency, Starc should look closer to home. "The whole thing to be honest is a fiasco," said the Yorkshire chairman. "This to me just shows that you get good agents and bad agents, and this agent hasn't done a proper job.
"We've got everything right, and Cricket Australia will look at it and say he's got what's required, and after that it's down to the agent. You can't blame the English authorities, they've got rules and regulations, and he didn't have the proper paperwork."
In a later tweet Starc insisted he "will be straight back to Uk ASAP once sorted. In time for next @Yorkshireccc game" ? against Hampshire at Headingley, starting next Wednesday. He had arrived in the country on Saturday night and his girlfriend ? the niece of the former Australia wicket keeper Ian Healy - has stayed in Yorkshire.
However, Graves made it clear that Yorkshire would not be bearing the cost of this mistake themselves. "We've told them straight, we're not paying the airfare again," he added. "We paid originally but now it's down to them."
At least Yorkshire will have Tim Bresnan available for a third consecutive Championship appearance ahead of the first Test against West Indies at Lord's next week.
Kevin Pietersen has been in such commanding form for Delhi Daredevils in the Indian Premier League in recent weeks that it is tempting to see some connection between his return for a rare County Championship appearance before next week's first Test against West Indies, and the receding of the floods that will allow Surrey's fixture against Worcestershire to go ahead at New Road. But even Pietersen will be powerless when the collection of former players who steer on-field policy for the International Cricket Council meet in Dubai this month to consider the switch-hit in which he specialises.
The ICC's cricket committee, which includes such luminaries as the former Australia captain Mark Taylor and Sri Lanka's Kumar Sangakkara, will be forced to tackle the recent controversies surrounding the Decision Review System, and are widely expected to recommend shifting the balance slightly back in favour of the batsmen. But Pietersen's unorthodox batting style has also sneaked on to their agenda, after it returned as a live issue during England's Test series in Sri Lanka last month.
Pietersen, who first unveiled the shot ? whereby he switches his stance and grip to hit as a left-handed batsman ? during a one-day international against New Zealand in Durham in 2008, was warned by the umpires for time-wasting when Sri Lanka's former captain Tillakaratne Dilshan pulled out of bowling to him on several occasions.
The committee is expected to recommend a different approach, whereby the bowler will be given a couple of minor advantages ? the right to an lbw decision wherever a ball pitches and a relaxation of the usual tight one-day rulings over leg?side wides.
None of that would seem likely to stop Pietersen playing the shot at the right moment, although it may not be his top priority on a Wednesday afternoon in Worcester. The game, for which he was ordered home by the England management to readjust to first-class cricket before the first Test, had been switched to a club ground in Kidderminster when New Road was engulfed late last week. But Worcestershire's chief executive, David Leatherdale, said a new drainage system installed since the ground was last flooded in 2007 had coped with "half a million litres of water" and that the outfield is now "bone dry".
Somerset have made the long journey to Durham with their only 11 fit senior players, after Jos Buttler split the webbing on his hand in fielding practice. The county's academy director, Jason Kerr, a Lancastrian all-rounder, will be 12th man for the game, and the director of cricket, Brian Rose, said: "We must have run over a black tiger, rather than a black cat, to cause such a crisis in personnel. I'm beginning to wonder what will happen next. I don't think I'll be taking my glasses to Durham. Otherwise I might be next in line for selection." Rose turns 62 next month.
The West Indies tourists are hopeful that Assad Fudadin and Narsingh Deonarine will be granted their visas in time to be available for their four-day game against England Lions which starts at Northampton on Thursday. After the belated arrival of Marlon Samuels following his IPL commitments, that would leave them at full strength with the possible exception of Fidel Edwards, the fast bowler who has a back problem.
Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/may/08/yorkshire-mitchell-starc-deportation
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