“He shouldn’t have been dropped. That was a poor decision”

Image courtesy of: Zimbio

Kevin Pietersen has criticised England for dropping opener Jason Roy during the Champions Trophy.

Coming into the tournament, Roy was struggling to regain his touch with the bat, but England captain Eoin Morgan vowed that the national team would stick with him throughout the competition.

However, after scoring 18 runs in England’s three group stage matches at an average of six, Morgan failed to live up to his promise as Roy was dropped for the semi-final against Pakistan.

Despite Roy failing to contribute, England won all three of their group stage games. However, they brought in Jonny Bairstow to replace him for the clash against Pakistan, which they went on to lose by eight wickets after being bowled out for 211.

“Everybody struggles, it’s a learning curve,” Pietersen said. “He’s a youngster, he’s not going to nail his whole career. You go through ups and downs, he’s a kid.

“What he’ll learn to deal with is how quickly to get himself out of this bit of bad form. Is he a bad player? No. He’s a wonderful player.

“He shouldn’t have been dropped. That was a poor decision. I think they should just have given him a run for the rest of the tournament. I’m not saying they would have won that game but they should have just stuck with it.

“They were scoring 300 regularly and then you drop a player and you get what you get. It’s not probably because of him getting dropped, because I think Jonny (Bairstow) batted ok. I wouldn’t have done it, but I’m not the coach or the captain.”

Pietersen also expressed his disappointment towards the fact that England were unable to win the Champions Trophy.

“England are a wonderful young team,” he said. “I know that India and Pakistan won’t like it, but in strength in depth in English conditions, England should have won it.

“With the fire-power they have got and they players they have got, they should have won this tournament.”