14 May 2015
Pietersen- shades of Achilles
by John Watson
As far as I know, Achilles was not much of a cricketer so perhaps it is odd that you will find things in common between his life and the career of Kevin Pietersen. We all know about Pietersen, of course, but for those whose copy of the Iliad languishes on their shelves it might be helpful to recap on Achilles. The son of a Greek king, Peleus, and the nymph Thetis, his mother dunked him in the river Styx so that he could only be wounded through the ankle by which she had held him. A fast runner and a great warrior, he was the main man for the Greeks in their war against Troy but he spent most of the period covered by the Iliad sulking in his tent. As a result Greek fortunes waned, the Trojans nearly burnt their ships and his best friend, who had borrowed his armour, was slaughtered. When all looked black for his comrades he rejoined the fighting and killed Hector the Trojan hero. The Greeks never looked back. What a return! What an entrance! What glory!
There are differences between his case and Pietersen’s. Achilles sulked in his tent because he felt insulted by the way the Greek leader Agamemnon had allocated the Trojan prisoners. Pietersen has been kept off the field by the ECB because, following his book, trust has broken down between them. Also Pietersen has yet to make a glorious reappearance. But, despite these differences in the storyline, the positions of Agamemnon and the ECB seem to be much the same. Things are in a mess and the only man with the skills to save the situation is sitting on the sidelines.
Managing genius is never easy. It requires techniques and judgements of the sort which are not taught in manuals on human relations. There are no real rules about how it should be done. In some cases there is a need for flattery, subtlety and cunning; wise counsel, perhaps, to avoid disaster arising. In others, the need may be for brutality, bombast and perhaps even a little bullying. What is clear, however, is the test of success. The game is to make sure that the talents of the genius are properly applied and you have failed in that game if you leave them rotting on the shelf. That is where Kevin Pietersen’s talents are now and it may well be too late for the new England management to do anything about it.
The pudding here is in the eating and the only conclusion can be that those responsible for managing Pietersen in the past, and indeed the man himself, have made a terrible hash of it all. You wonder how it goes wrong. Is the management of a man like Pietersen, or a man like Jeremy Clarkson come to that, so intrinsically difficult that no mortal can do it successfully? Of course not. Difficult men have been well managed before. After all, Allenby managed Lawrence of Arabia successfully and, genius as he was, there was nothing easy about him. No, it is more that the management of the difficult requires techniques which are way outside the rules. Keep to the rules and it may be difficult for others to criticise you. To sack Troy or to produce a successful test side something more is needed.
