Andrew Flintoff declared himself ready to play on the eve of the fourth npower Test match against Australia at Headingley Carnegie, only for the England management to refuse to gamble with the all-rounder’s fitness, The Times can reveal.
A devastated Flintoff was not seen at the ground throughout the match, which ended yesterday in a comprehensive defeat for England by an innings and 80 runs, levelling the Ashes series at 1-1 with one Test to play.
Flintoff will see his surgeon today and England will be desperate for him to play in the deciding match at the Brit Oval, which starts in ten days’ time. It would be Flintoff’s last match before his retires from Test cricket.
“I’ve seen a few disappointed sportsmen over the last couple of months but I’ve never seen anybody as low as Flintoff was on Thursday night when he was told he would not be selected,” Andrew “Chubby” Chandler, Flintoff’s agent, said.
“He told them that he was fit enough to get through, that he felt no different to how he felt at Edgbaston and that he could get through and do his bit. They didn’t want him.
“He was prepared to do whatever it takes, was prepared to put whatever needed to be put into his knee. The whole point of announcing his retirement when he did was to clear his head and prepare to do whatever needed to be done to play the final Test matches of his career.”
Chandler, whose clients include Lee Westwood, the British golfer who missed a putt on the final green to get into a play-off at the Open Championship last month, added: “He [Flintoff] just didn’t see it coming. He wanted to play and they didn’t want him, and he didn’t see that coming at all.”
Although Andrew Strauss, the England captain, said clearly before the match that the decision on Flintoff’s availability would be taken by himself and Andy Flower, the team director, it was widely assumed after watching the all-rounder’s final net session that the decision to leave him out was taken in conjunction with Flintoff and his medical advisers. Clearly not.
England will insist that Flintoff’s selection was too much of a gamble and that the decision to leave him out was a strong one. How much better it would have been if they had shown a similar amount of strength at the beginning of the season over the participation of Flintoff and Kevin Pietersen in the Indian Premier League.
Pietersen carried an injury into that tournament and Flintoff was injured during it, so that England played the most important days of the summer without either.
Questions will now be asked about the wisdom of leaving England’s talismanic all-rounder out of such a critical fixture. If he was certain that he could get through, was the risk not worth taking? Given the way he batted at Edgbaston, he would have stiffened a line-up that failed miserably, given Strauss some much-needed control with the ball and provided the balance so clearly missing.
Chandler insists that the adrenalin would have helped Flintoff to beat the pain barrier at Headingley, as it did at Lord’s. “What they didn’t take into account during Thursday’s practice was that there was no adrenalin,” he said. “That was why he looked as though he was struggling so much and why he became so much worse on the final day at Edgbaston, when it was clear the game could not be won.
“He was hurting at Lord’s but the adrenalin got him through. It would have got him through this week as well. His presence would certainly have lifted the crowd and the team, because without him they don’t have much inspiration.”
As England begin to consider their options for the Oval, Flintoff will see his surgeon and work out a medium-term prognosis that is likely to include the possibility of further surgery after the last Test and a long rehabilitation programme before he begins his new career as a one-day player only.
However, even if he does play, the events of the past three days mean that the fairytale ending he so craves looks an increasingly distant dream.
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