Trescothick himself has payed a high price for England's attitude.
That attitude is Test cricket is the most important (nothing wrong with that), but the Ashes has been put out of all proportion. If this was any other tour Trescothick would not of gone.
According to the The Independent today his consultant said he wasn't ready for the ICC Trophy and as The Independent concludes if he wasn't ready for that there is no way he was ready for The Ashes.
Now surely the England mangement would of concluded he won't be ready for the Ashes but perhaps the World Cup. Quiet the World Cup means nothing in England.

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"Checkout the big brain on Brett" Pulp Fiction

If you are a track / field athelete you face the same situation: the Olympics overshadow everything else. The same is true in many other sports: I'm sure Steve Redgrave considered the world championships to be pretty major... but his rowing career also revolved around the four-year cycle of the Olympics. Sports like golf and tennis, with their annual cycle of majors, are basically the exception rather than the rule: having the big pressure focus of all attention is part of the attraction.

Boycott had an article on Tresco in today's Daily Telegraph... and he has lots of sympathy for the guy... but points the blame more squarely at the money men and management: those who would get Tresco playing more pyjama games in a year than players of Boycott's generation might play in a career, filling the entire calendar with high-intensity, high pressure cricket and allowing none of the respite that came with playing club cricket.

Boycott's argument makes more sense...

Yes I agree with Boycott argument. But they are general arguments they are not specific. It is not as if crickters have missed tours in the past they have. The thing is all proportion is lost and all judgement was lost over Trescothick's future because it was the Ashes.

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"Checkout the big brain on Brett" Pulp Fiction

If he doesn't enjoy the game this is between him and mangement. It was up to the mangement to make a decision and as so often when there is pressure of results they make the wrong one. They chose to see what they wanted to see and listen to the opinions they wanted to hear. Until it became so obvious with Trescothick apparently bursting in to tears that they realised 80,000 screaming Australians might not be the right place for him.
So this could of all been avoided and maybe he could of been brought back under less testing conditions.

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"Checkout the big brain on Brett" Pulp Fiction

I just think it's terribly sad.

I can remember an article written around twelve years ago by (?) Simon Barnes possibly?

Which said something along the lines of: "We read in the stars that a man called Hick would lead English cricket out of the mire.
What we hadn't realised was that the man wasn't called Graeme Hick; he was actually called Marcus-Trescot Hick."

I've been sat in the pub today trying to explain to a friend how his depression(? is it depression? probably) must be manifesting itself.

And I can vaguely imagine that Trescothick had been standing at slip, put one down, and then burst into tears.

Seriously. I can imagine that. I have seen depression, and what it does to people.

IF it is like that, and it might well be... it might also be absolutely nothing like that at all.
But if it is like that; I was wondering if it would be possible to play through it. I mean, it could be slightly disconcerting for the Australians.

McGrath sends one down, Banger doesn't move his feet but still carts the tall angry one into the covers. Michael Clark fields. Banger bursts into tears.

Ponting puts an arm around him. Strauss wanders down the wicket, Banger blows his nose and puts up his hand and McGrath comes in again, short, Banger smashes him over mid-wicket. Four! Banger bursts into tears.

It must be possible. I suppose the difficulty would be watching the ball with your eyes full of tears.

That said, I hope he recovers and scores shed loads of runs for Somerset next summer.

Maybe he's just missing his beloved sausages.

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Red-it, Red-it, Read it and wept

No one except Trescothick and his medical team and close confidantes know why he is suffering from depression.

It is so complex a disease that it is completely irresponsible and just serving your own point making purposes to blame "pyjama cricket", money men or anyone else for his current malaise.

His problems might be just that. His problems. It doesn't always have to be a symptom of some overriding issue everyone else has to look out for.

I've known people with everything going for them who hit one dilemma that most would deal with quite easily
just break down into quivering wrecks.

But because the problem has to do with our most mysterious organ, the brain, we tend to overanalyse and need more far out answers than if it were a problem with a kidney or pancreas etc...

I cannot believe that the England management would even contemplate picking Trescothick for the World Cup.He needs a total break from cricket and joining back up with his Somerset teammates will hopefully serve him better in the long run than being exposed to the pressure of the World Cup.

I wish him well for the future.

Do we actually know that it is depression? All I've seen mentioned is a "stress related illness". I'm no doctor, but that could mean any number of things to me. I initially interpreted it as something like "stage fright", which many entertainers have suffered from throughout their careers, sometimes to good effect (Tommy Cooper springs to mind) and sometimes to tragic effect (Tony Hancock). Whatever Trescothick's problem is, it seems clear that putting him back in the limelight isn't the answer, so keeping him out of it just might be. But he and his advisers need to work on that. To deal with John's opening point, however, I don't agree with the basic premise that Trescothick was somehow rushed back only because we have an Ashes series to play. He himself declared himself "ready to play", and in the first case anyone would ask the patient how he felt, surely? So I don't place any real blame on the ECB set up in this instance - nor on anyone else. It's a sad situation for MT, but he needs to find his own way through it, and false starting once or twice just might be inevitable, I'm afraid.

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Money won't buy you friends. But it gets you a better class of enemy.
Spike Milligan

Well if what I read is true that the Consultant said he wasn't ready for the ICC Trophy there are questions to be asked. If someone is ready for their top away series of their career why miss the ICC trophy? They have already had lots of rest. Every opinion I have read (only a few) says there was major misjudgement in this affair.
The question would they rush a England player back for the Ashes? Is the Pope a Catholic?

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"Checkout the big brain on Brett" Pulp Fiction