The case for the prosecution:

Panesar

From the start, Panesar has received some odd treatment in the press from Fletcher. He was pretty luke-warm when he was picked, and then utterly bizarre in the summer. When he took wickets on a helpful pitch, Fletcher wanted to see what he's like on unfriendly pitches. When he won a match on such a pitch (Headingley?), he had a go at his batting and fielding. Then, out of the blue, he says he's the best finger spinner in the world. Then promptly drops him. Which leads us to

Panesar v Giles

Interesting to see the story in today's mail. Whatever the facts, at best it seems that Fletcher wanted Panesar to play instead of Anderson, not Giles. But nobody suggests that Monty is Fletcher's no. 1 spinner, which is ludicrous. To play Giles instead of Monty in the first Test was an error, to play him in the second a serious a mistake, but his justification of the selection after Adelaide that it was still the right choice is laughable. He said that Giles had scored 27 in the first innings, justifying his place. Incredible! He also said that Warne had batted very well at eight. Quite right, and very valuable. But that's not why he's in the side. Warne is a great bowler, very good fielder and decent bat, but he plays fo4r Australia because of his bowling. If he fielded like Devon Malcolm and batted like Chris Martin (of either New Zealand or Coldplay fame) would Australia have played Cameron White? Of course not. If we're so desperate to bat to number eight, why not just stick Ed Joyce there and be done with it.

Incidentially, Giles may have scored 27. But he came in with England 491-6. Hardly pressure is it? Then, when we needed runs in the second innings, he bottled it. To be fair, we shouldn't be pinning this defeat on Giles, but to suggest he contributed much to the game simply isn't true.

Let's hope Fletcher wins over that fearsome management committee before Perth.

Read

Without re-hashing the same old debates, Fletcher's treatment of Read in this series was, IMHO, disgraceful. To publicly drop a player in the middle of a match (one in which he wasn't even playing) is outrageous. Read had a poor champions trophy - who didn't - but his Test performances had been good. Jones was hardly setting the world alight in the practice games - Phil Jacques, anyone? - and I can not remember a precedent for such a public dropping. Fletcher's comments - basically that Read had no bottle - were utterly uncalled for and, frankly, shameful.

One Day Cricket

Let's start caring about this, shall we? I know it's not as important as Test cricket, but it still matters. It certainly matters how we do in the world cup. England's attitude to it is appalling, and Fletcher is at least in part responsible.

I could go on. Fletcher's been fantastic, but it's time to move on. Whatever the result in the Ashes, I personally hope Fletcher will make way. The time is right.
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Admin - Link to original thread in the England forum: Fletcher: Lose the Ashes and Lose Your Job?
Nominated by Oliver.

Panesar - Judging by a piece on teletext on the BBC, it may not have been Fletcher who ruled Panesar out of the team for the first test, apparently that honour might go to Fred.

Jones - Should not have been recalled in the first place. However, his keeping has been good, his sledging better, and his batting woeful. It is a rich irony that the clamour for his dropping has (both times) reached fever point when his keeping has been acceptable, and at times very good. Most people could see Jones being picked, however it was the crass comments about Read's inability to handle pressure which irked.

It's common knowledge that England have failed to fill the gap left by Simon Jones' absence. Mahmood is consistently inconsistent, Plunkett offers little, Anderson has been unfit and Lewis needs favourable conditions. to be fair to Fletcher, he has tried different bowlers, but nobody has stepped up to the plate. This may explain his obsession with increasing the batting options, to cover for the inability to keep up pressure with a rotating bowling attack.

I think there may be a case of unrealistic expectations, not many sides go to Austrailia and win. Especially not a side missing a strike bowler, having a spearhead there in body but not mind, an all-rounder who has just returned to fitness, and is burdened with captaincy (not fletcher's sole choice IIRC) and missing both captain and senior batsman. I could not see England winning in aussie anyway this summer, so blaming fletcher is neither here nor there. Fletcher to stay, he has done far more good than harm, and has made england a respected force again.

One other thing, I completely fail to see how Rod Marsh gets the reputation he has among some people on this board. You'd think he was the chief architect of englands renaissance, rather than a guy who had the cushy job of working with the cream of the young players at the academy, before, by several accounts, championing his young players when they clearly were not ready, and comparing chris read's batting to adam gilchrist and mark boucher's!

At the time those comments were made (2003-2004) Gilchrist batting blindfolded with no bat would have scored twice as many runs as read. Marsh was blinkered in his viewpoint, had little respect for coach or captain(s) and, naturally, having not been heard of in a while, has resurfaced to say "i told you so" despite having to wait nearly three years for the opportunity, as the players he derided were winning series and playing good cricket.

As for Troy Cooley, Fletcher had nothing to do with his departure, and was on record as being highly appreciative of the way he had helped mould the fast bowlers into a unit both on and off the pitch. Is there anything else we shoudl unjustly blame fletcher for? War in Iraq?

Another criticism of fletcher is his championing of temperament over talent on some occasions. Perhaps we shoudl look at which england batsman averages over 100 for the series?
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Nominated by Admin.