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Former England captain Alastair Cook has responded to criticism from former teammate Kevin Pietersen over his comments on Jacob Bethell, asking him to leave Indian Premier League (IPL) 2026 midway and play County cricket as he was benched. Pietersen had slammed Cook saying that the England red-ball legend has no idea about IPL. Cook took a diplomatic turn while maintaining that he just expressed his opinion. He also pointed out that since his comment on Bethell, the youngster has been included as impact player.
“I just gave my opinion. I can justify that at the time he wasn’t playing, and he didn’t play (much) last year either. So, he had that benefit of doing once or twice. In my opinion, he has done a bit of that. Ironically, since all that came out, he has now played a bit," Cook said on Stick to Cricket podcast.
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Cook went on to say that no player who is part of the IPL will go on to say on record that the competition is ‘terrible’. He also claimed that people have said that the competition is good as it seems but not on a public platform. He feels that no player would like to criticise the tournament at the risk of upsetting their bosses.
“I get the other argument of learning but there’s got to be a stage where you have to play. You can’t just learn from them. I know the IPL is a great tournament, but no one is ever publicly going to say that IPL is not the place to be," he said.
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“I actually understand both arguments like he has signed the contract, (so) I’m going to honour my contract. Now, I don’t know what the IPL is like quite clearly, but you hear some of the little undercurrents like it’s not quite as good as everyone thinks it is. I’m not slagging off the IPL – no one ever is going to say it’s terrible because they don’t want to upset their bosses because they want another contract. I actually feel two opinions can be right," he added.
Bethell gets 3 games, another England batter waiting for a chance
Since Cook’s comments, Bethell has played three games. However, the former opener’s comments did not lead to RCB team management’s change of heart. Phil Salt has suffered a finger injury which made Bethell the ideal batting partner for Virat Kohli. The southpaw had scored his maiden T20 century in the T20 World Cup 2026 semifinal at Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai. He has scored 39 runs from three innings.
While Cook made certain comments about Bethell, there is another English batter in RCB lineup who is yet to play a game. Jordan Cox, who was roped in for his base price of Rs 75 lakh, is waiting to make his debut.
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