Former England legend Graeme Swann has revealed scathing details about his bad relationship with former teammate Kevin Pietersen, comparing him to Adolf Hitler and blaming him for the demolition that England received at the hands of Australia during the 2013-14 Ashes series.
According to Swann, Pietersen sent insulting texts about captain Andrew Strauss and coach Andy Flower to opposition players during a Test match against South Africa. “We found out two or three days before because we’d all seen the texts,” Swann said on The Rig Biz Podcast.
“The most bizarre (sequence of events), you know you’re living in a bit of a soap opera. I mean Kev’s different, let’s face it, I have no hard feelings … but Kev’s different to everyone else I’ve ever met in my life and he knows he’s different and he says he’s different.”
“It was the early days of the (Sony) Ericsson 350 flip, so no one knew you could take photos and stuff like that. So legally, England didn’t have any grounds for sacking him, so he was reintegrated.
After that game, the England team had a meeting in Oxford, and talking about it, Swann remembered going all guns blazing against Pietersen. He said, “He (Kevin) was there, Alistair Cook was there and Andy Flower, I went both barrels because I thought I f–king can’t believe I’ve got to this on my day off and Kev was very defensive and said ‘I had to fly back from South Africa for this’, well it is your f–king fault Kevin.
“I’m not sure how everyone else went, after the meeting Alistair Cook rang me up and said Jesus Christ you did go both barrels. I felt I could because me and Kev never liked each other anyway, a lot of other people either like him a bit or got on with him but me and Kev always hated each other.”
“Adolf Hitler had a point, the bigger the lie more people will believe it,” he added.
Swann retired from international cricket during the Ashes series, and he believes that Pietersen's aim was to get the coach and captain of the team sacked. The former Delhi Capitals (DC) captain was soon informed that he would not be retained by his team.
“(There was a) general undermining of the captain and trying to get the captain sacked and the coach sacked, and generally being a bit of a knob, bit of a dickhead but we didn’t know all this. We just thought Kev’s Kev but he was being quite nasty behind the scenes and using his friends in the press, it was messy.”
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