Footballer Jamie Tandy walks free after revelation assaulting partner

Former Manchester City player Jamie Tandy, 25, who now works as a window cleaner, was given a suspended jail term after assaulting his girlfriend

A footballer has been spared a jail term for viciously assaulting his girlfriend after blaming his actions on former teammate Joey Barton.

Former Manchester City player Jamie Tandy was told he should have gone to jail after he beat his girlfriend during two years of alcohol-fuelled attacks.

But the 25-year-old was given a suspended sentence after a judge said his "hopes and dreams were taken away" when shamed footballer Joey Barton stubbed a cigar out in his eye during a club Christmas party in 2004.

Bolton Crown Court heard Tandy had begun drinking when he was released by Manchester City in 2005 after breaking his leg during a loan spell in Denmark.

He later lost his home and twice tried to commit suicide as he faced debts of up to 30,000.

During one attack on Sian Heron, his girlfriend of six years, Tandy broke her nose shouting "look what you made me do", as their then two-year-old daughter was sitting in her lap.

He then tried to put her shattered nose back in place.

The court heard the father-of-two also pulled out a clump of Miss Heron"s hair and slashed her neck with a fork.

Tandy, of Whitefield, Greater Manchester, who now plays non-league football for Witton Albion, successfully sued Joey Barton for 65,000 in damages claiming the cigar attack had caused him "major psychiatric deterioration".

David Clark, prosecuting, said Tandy had attacked Miss Heron virtually every week from 2007 until she left him last year.

He said: "He told police about how his promising career as a footballer was dead because of the attack he suffered at the hands of Joey Barton back in 2004.

"He told how he started drinking and lost his house. He attended rehab in 2008 due to the abuse but started drinking again in November 2009.

"He explained that the consumption of alcohol was a big part of the reason for his behaviour."

Katherine Pierpoint, defending, said Tandy had been on a downward spiral since the attack by Joey Barton.

Blamed: The court heard Tandy"s promising career went off the rails after then teammate Joey Barton stubbed a cigar out in his eye

She added: "Perhaps he could have chosen to act in a different way, he could have acted in a more responsible way.

"He was so young and had been taken out of everything so suddenly, when before he had everything to look forward to.

"For a long period of time, five years, he has been in a destructive cycle."

Tandy, who cleans windows to make ends meet, admitted common assault and battery. The couple have now split up.

He was given a 12-month sentence, suspended for two years and a two-year community rehabilitation order. He was also ordered to pay Miss Heron 1,000 in compensation and 150 court costs.

Sentencing, recorder Francis Davis said: "You should go to prison. What you did to that lady was not only inexcusable it was cowardly and selfish.

"While there were difficulties in your life you thought the appropriate way to deal with them was to feel sorry for yourself.

"But I"m conscious of the misfortune that struck you with the destruction of your football career which caused you as a young man considerable difficulties.

"You need to grow up and you need to start thinking of other people for once. That part of your life is gone. You have to start thinking about your children."

An Inspector Calls Valentines Day special: Where to book a regretful mangle (and live happily ever after)

Only two weeks to go. So book a romantic break today and live happily ever after...

Fairytale: Bodysgallen Hall and Spa in Llandudno is Grade I-listed

THE ROYAL HARBOUR HOTEL, KENT

You can see France from here on a clear day but don"t let that put you off. This is an extra special B&B spread over two handsome townhouses with loads of quirky style.

It"s essential to book the Bob Hoskins suite (he stayed here while filming the forthcoming Ruby Tuesday) on the first floor. There"s an open fire, open access to wi-fi and an altogether open atmosphere. Help yourself to drinks, and cheese and biscuits during the night.

The engaging owner, James Thomas, collects art and is a movie buff. There"s a cinema in the basement. A star performance all round.

FEEL THE LOVE: Get the fire going and ignite the crackle of passion.

DETAILS: The Royal Harbour Hotel, Ramsgate, Kent CT11 9JF, 01843 591514, www.royalharbourhotel.co.uk. Doubles from 90 B&B.

More...Get the latest travel deals with the Editor"s pick of bargainsFind more ideas for UK getaways by clicking hereValentine"s Day 2010: Best breaks for a truly romantic getawayAn Inspector Calls Valentine"s Day special: Where to book a break

BODYSGALLEN HALL AND SPA, LLANDUDNO

This Grade I-listed, 17th-century mansion stands in a large park with a knot garden, follies and views of Snowdonia and Conwy Castle.

Now owned by the National Trust, it leaves you pining to win the lottery, so you can own a place such as this. Look out for ancestral portraits, antiques, splendid fireplaces, stone-mullioned windows, log fires and a great spa.

Grab a table by the window in the dining room. There are 15 rooms in the main house, plus 16 cottages dotted among the 200 acres. Dress code is "smart casual", but no one in their right mind would wear trainers for dinner here.

FEEL THE LOVE: The Celtic Tranquillity back massage with hot stones should do the trick.

DETAILS: Bodysgallen Hall, Llandudno, North Wales, LL30 1RS, 01492 584466, www.bodysgallen.com. Doubles from 165 B&B.

Quirky: The Royal Harbour Hotel is situated in Ramsgate and has views over the seafront

THE KINGHAM PLOUGH, OXFORDSHIRE

Sleek, beautiful and full of confidence and that"s just the staff, most of whom are earning a crust before travelling during their gap year.

Fabulous food at reasonable prices, with pretty rooms upstairs, all set in a picture-postcard Cotswolds village where everyone drives a 4x4 and thinks David Cameron is a jolly good fellow. Unmatching tables, church chairs, stone floors, big linen napkins.

FEEL THE LOVE: Try reading poetry while your partner soaks in the free - standing bath.

DETAILS: The Kingham Plough, Kingham, Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire OX7 6YD, 01608 658327, www.thekinghamplough.co.uk.

MANOR HOUSE FARM, NORFOLK

No one will find you here. Tucked away deep in the Norfolk countryside, you are about 30 minutes from the coast and an age away from the rigours of modern life.

There are two rooms in a stable block attached to the main house. Breakfast is taken in Mr and Mrs Ellis"s smart dining room, and a must is a walk around the immaculate gardens.

FEEL THE LOVE: Visit the 13th-century church next to the house and commit.

DETAILS: Manor House Farm, Wellingham, King"s Lynn, Norfolk PE32 2TH, 01328 838227, www.manor-house-farm.co.uk. Doubles from 40 per person B&B.

Smitten: Love is in the air at the sleek Kingham Plough which offers great food and reasonable prices

HOTEL ENDSLEIGH, DEVON

This former fishing lodge on the River Tamar, near Tavistock, is an Olga Polizzi production and it will seduce you from the moment you walk in and admire the flickering candles. What a setting!

Built by the Duke of Bedford in 1812, the house offers uninterrupted views stretching over Dartmoor.

There are no gimmicks, no ugly signage, no staff wearing badges or wilting roses in their corporate lapels. Just pure indulgence.

FEEL THE LOVE: Read up on the 18th-century designer Humphry Repton, who created the hotel"s gardens, and impress during dinner.

DETAILS: Hotel Endsleigh, Milton Abbot, Tavistock, Devon PL19 0PQ, 01822 870 000, www.hotelendsleigh.com. Doubles from 210, B&B.

DEAN STREET TOWNHOUSE, LONDON

New, trendy, ideally positioned in the centre of town and dead sexy. Staff are on top of their game.

Be sure to book a table (well in advance) in the dining room where the walls are covered with paintings and sketches by the likes of Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin. There"s also an open fire in the parlour.

The building is Grade II-listed. If you can"t get your partner excited here, then it might be time to seek romantic pastures new.

FEEL THE LOVE: Avoid the Soho sex shop at the end of the street.

DETAILS: Dean Street Townhouse, 69-71 Dean Street, London W1D 3SE, 020 7434 1775, www.deanstreettownhouse.com. Doubles from 112, room only.

Catch of the day: The Hotel Endsleigh in Devon is a former fishing lodge on the River Tamar

KNOCKINAAM LODGE, DUMFRIES AND GALLOWAY

You"ve pretty much got a private beach in front of this 19th-century former hunting lodge. Wild, windy and wonderfully evocative.

Churchill secretly met Eisenhower here during World War II. It has a candlelit dining room and good food. A touch old-fashioned.

But, then, Valentine"s Day pays homage to the past.

There are resident black labradors who will join you on walks if required.

FEEL THE LOVE: Try this Mae West line after paddling in the sea: "Let"s get out of these wet clothes and slip into a dry martini."

DETAILS: Knockinaam Lodge, Portpatrick, Dumfries and Galloway DG9 9AD, 01776 810471, www.knockinaamlodge.com. Dinner, bed and breakfast from 120 per person.

THE BATH ARMS, WILTSHIRE

A former Young"s boozer that has metamorphosed into a wonderfully cerebral pub-come -restaurant-come-hotel at prices that put others to shame.

You"re on the Longleat estate here, and there"s a portrait of wacky Lord Bath in a turban hanging in the dining room.

Take a peep at the skittle alley at the top of the house. Rooms are quirky, pillows and duvets are creamy soft.

There are lots of good walks nearby before you enjoy a 29.50 three-course dinner.

FEEL THE LOVE: One room is called the Kama Sutra. No pressure.

DETAILS: The Bath Arms, The Longleat Estate, Warminster BA12 7LY, 01985 844308, www.batharms.co.uk. Doubles from 95 B&B.

Qu�? Help on approach for British expats struggling to go local in Spain

Graham Keeley, Madrid & , : {}

When Charles Johnston ventured from his prosaic on the Costa del Sol to revisit Madrid he shortly found himself in prohibited water.

When he ran a bath Mr Johnston was astounded to find the daub noted C was for prohibited caliente rather than cold water. In contrast, at home in Malaga the taps were C for cold and H for hot, as in Britain.

Spanish plumbing valid a potent, if improbable, pitch of a informative sequence that stalks a little British expatriates in Spain. Some Britons vital on the Costa Blanca are angry when they ring their internal legislature and find that no one speaks English.

When her father died, one British lady had to run down the travel to the nearest interpretation use since she had no thought who to call.

Related LinksHomeward bound? Expats feel the pinchWinter fuel excavation for 64,000 expats in Europe

Fortunately, for those Britons in Spain whose authority of the denunciation appears to widen no serve than hola or gracias and who are lost in Spanish bureaucracy, assistance is at hand: Spanish polite servants are to work at the British consulates in Malaga and Alicante to assistance expatriates to confederate with their neighbours.

In a understanding in between Britain and Spain, the staff will suggest recommendation on traffic with health services, induction with the internal authorities and skill problems.

More than one million Britons are thought to live in Spain for at slightest piece of the year. However, most of the thousands who headed there to retire in the object never purebred with internal authorities or health services, preferring to compensate taxes in Britain or rely on benefits paid behind home.

Because the bruise has depressed opposite the euro and with Spain in a recession, most have found that the mental condition has soured. With a meagre authority of Spanish and faced with perplexing to fathom their approach by a labyrinthine bureaucracy, a rising series are struggling to cope. Expatriate assist agencies inform that a little have turn contingent on handouts.

Others paid for authorised holiday homes, putting their certitude in estate agents or lawyers simply since they spoke a little English. Only after did they find that the mental condition homes were bootleg and faced demolition.

Mary McKechnie, of the British Association of Marbella, said: I lose calm with a little people who cant contend some-more than gracias [thank you] and por preference [please] and dont know how to do anything.

Karen OReilly, of Loughborough University, writer of The British on the Costa del Sol, said: The main point is that formation is related to amicable exclusion. People who are not integrated can finish up socially excluded.

I do not meant they have to sense the denunciation and/or have Spanish friends, but they do need to assimilate the manners and regulations and be authorised residents in sequence to explain rights and to have responsibilities.

In an talk with The Times, Chris Bryant, the Europe Minister who Spain last week end to encounter British expatriates, said: I would interest to British people vital in Spain to register with the authorities and with the health services.

hair wig

Anger grows at Dubai hit-squads pass ruse

James Hider, Jerusalem and Hugh Tomlinson, Dubai & , : {}

Relatives of Israelis held up in the mass temperament burglary that aided the gangland slaying of a Hamas personality in Dubai uttered their annoy yesterday as vigour mounted on the main think in the killing: Mossad.

Its transparent that bootleg make make make use of of of was done of personal information, pronounced Raphael Cannon. His 62-year-old father, Roy, was one of the unfamiliar nationals whose calculated passports were used in the Dubai murder.

Dubai military have expelled the names of fifteen some-more people whose personal sum were used by the strike patrol to lift out the Jan nineteen killing, nonetheless Israeli security analysts hold that the emirates military force competence be struggling to pinpoint that of the twenty-six suspects were involved.

Who are we ostensible to strike about something similar to this? Mr Cannon said, giving opening to the disappointment of majority of the people whose identities competence have been purloined by their adoptive nation to kill a man whose organisation, Hamas, has sworn to fall short the Jewish state.

Related LinksAustralia warns Israel over pass abuseHamas founder"s son spied for Israel

Eight of the new identities suited those of Israelis of unfamiliar origin. Some have reacted with resignation. Others are harm that they competence have been put at risk of retaliatory attacks from Hamas, the belligerent Palestinian organisation that has sent scores of self-murder bombers in to Israel in the past.

Sarah Bruce, whose sons name was between those on the ultimate list of suspects, pronounced she was repelled at the make make make use of of of of her son Joshua Daniels temperament writings to kill Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, who was suspected of being the point man in Hamass bootlegging of Iranian weapons to Gaza. I am fearful, but hopefully everybody will see that it is fraud. Its not his print in the cinema theyre flashing around everywhere, she said.

Australia, that has been dragged in to the tactful row along with Britain, France, Ireland and Germany, warned Israel that the purported make make make use of of of of fake Australian passports was not deliberate the action of a friend.

In the majority strong general reply nonetheless to the Dubai killing, Stephen Smith, the Foreign Minister, summoned the Israeli Ambassador to direct his co-operation in the review of the temperament thefts.

We have done no end about what to us seems to be a critical abuse of 3 Australian passports possibly by anything forged or temperament fraud, Mr Smith told reporters.

If the formula of that review means us to come to the end that the abuse of Australian passports was sponsored or condoned by Israeli officials, afterwards Australia would not courtesy that as the action of a friend.

Israels worried Government has discharged the criticism. There has been most press condemnation of the strike but additionally majority expressions of honour that Israel can discharge the enemies.

Intelligence experts expel disbelief on conjecture that the bearing of as majority as twenty-six tip agents competence harm Mossads capability to work in future.

You could take all twenty-six of them and put them in a line on foot subsequent to the military arch of Dubai and he wouldnt recognize them, pronounced one security expert, adding that the summary of anticipation to Hamas was value the risk.

hair wig

David Cameron contingency not turn the clunking fist Rachel Sylvester

Rachel Sylvester & , : {}

It was the face that launched a thousand spoofs. The design of David Cameron that the Tories used in their initial print of the choosing debate was as well sleek, as well shiny. It was easy to hold that it had been airbrushed but a Conservative strategist insists that it wasnt. The law is worse, he says. Dave does essentially see identical to that. His cheeks unequivocally are that smooth.

The squeezing in the Tory check lead can, at slightest in part, be explained by the actuality that Mr Cameron still as well mostly gives the clarity that he thinks he was innate to order rather than that he has to debate to spin Prime Minister with a transparent thought of what he wants to do with the job.

Its not only the well-scrubbed open schoolboys face, the slick, orderly brushed hair or the smart-enough- to-dress-down open-neck shirt. Its not only the losses explain for wisteria pleat or the organic veg vegetable patch or even the Eton and Bullingdon Club background.

The Notting Hill set that runs the Tory Party has managed to emanate a feeling that they are, as Sir Nicholas Winterton put it so memorably, a opposite category of people.

BACKGROUNDLord Ashcroft admits - "Yes, I am a non-dom"Cameron tells Tories to "get up and fight"Opinion polls blips: provide with counsel

Lord Ashcroft, the partys emissary chairman, voiced yesterday that he is a non-dom and, therefore, does not compensate taxation in this nation on his abroad income. That reinforces the clarity that the Tory high authority is a rich elite, some-more gentle in the Caribbean than in Canning Town.

When Mr Cameron describes the Conservatives as the celebration of the bad it conjures up a design of the internal grandee handing out food parcels to inspired villagers. When the Tory personality hugs huskies it looks a bit identical to Prince Charles hugging trees, an environmentalism secure in a enterprise to conserve. The damaged multitude is something fanciful and remote from the white stuccoed villas of West London or the white beaches of Belize.

This isnt category war. There is a cliquishness to the Cameron round that conveys the clarity that the members are isolated from the rest of the country. They are godparents to each others children, they share propagandize runs and barter cooking parties. Unlike those around Margaret Thatcher, John Major, Tony Blair or Gordon Brown, key members of the middle organisation are firm together by loyalty initial and governing body second. There is an incestuousness to a set that had rows and reconciliations, romances and rejections, approach prior to it ever thought of looking power.

But, as they come to an election, citizens wish to know either the Conservative personality would be an in effect Prime Minister, not either he is a constant friend. Its not sufficient for Mr Cameron to think that he would be great at the job, or to believe, in a rather blue-blooded way, that it is his avocation to offer his country. He has to remonstrate a distrustful citizens that he has a clarity of mission about the kind of Britain he wants and a clarity of role about how he would emanate it.

He cannot simply ask if citizens can bear five some-more years of Gordon Brown. There is no nationalistic avocation to get absolved of the Labour Government. His nationalistic avocation is, if elected, to run the nation as well as he can. This has to be a conflict of ideas, fuelled by passion.

The Tories have been wobbling for weeks. There have been disagreements about how most process sum the celebration should exhibit prior to the choosing and either they should put themselves on the side of confidence or pessimism. Right-wingers have been pressuring Mr Cameron to go over in earnest spending cuts.

Last weekends open discussion was a watershed moment. In his speech, the personality finished transparent that he had no goal of floating the Tory dog alarm and pronounced that he still believes that fever will win the day. After weeks of confusion, he additionally voiced that a matrimony taxation process would be in in between plans suggested prior to the nation votes I am told the elite preference is a transferrable taxation stipend for tied together relatives of immature children.

But one brawl stays unresolved: the change in in between certain and disastrous campaigning in the run-up to polling day.

There is flourishing regard in in between a little Shadow Cabinet ministers and strategists about the increasingly assertive tinge Mr Cameron uses opposite Mr Brown. It is, they believe, no fluke that the check opening has narrowed as the Tory personality launches a array of increasingly sarcastic personal attacks on the Prime Minister. Last week, for example, by branch the brag in to the victim, Mr Cameron seems to have simply no longer soft await for Mr Brown. There was a identical recoil to the Conservatives dubious genocide taxation print campaign. Although ministers confess secretly that even I couldnt bear an additional five years of Gordon, the Labour personality is someway gaining open apply oneself for flourishing all the blame and coups. The Tory leaders attacks receptive to advice overbearing and arrogant, personification in to the innate to order picture and reminding citizens of his partys nasty past. Its ideally bona fide to support the choosing as a preference in in between Brown and Cameron and disastrous campaigning has a piece in that, says one frontbencher. But David shouldnt be you do it himself. We need a Norman Tebbit, an conflict dog who can do it on his behalf.

The squeezing of the polls could in the finish assistance Mr Cameron. The big lead contributed to a clarity that he was cruising facilely towards the tip job, vouchsafing Lord Mandelson have Labour the underdogs.

Mr Cameron might have had a absolved upbringing, but after the genocide of his eldest child, Ivan, a year ago, nobody can contend that he has had a bewitched life. He has regularly finished most appropriate when he is the heroic David pitching himself opposite Goliath either it was David Davis, the prime to win the leadership, the Tory Taleban who attempted to see off womanlike candidates, or Mr Brown. As the choosing nears, Mr Cameron contingency be clever not to spin himself in to the hulk who crushes the opponents pelting him with slingshots.

If he continues to combine on a impression gangland slaying of the Prime Minister rather than on emphasising what he would do in No 10, he will spin off citizens quite women. If he uses the sort of denunciation in the TV debates that he has deployed in the Commons not long ago the citizens will be appalled. It would be a outrageous inapplicable designation for the childish challenger to spin himself in to the big clunking fist.

Yorkshire Ripper launches bid for jail recover UK headlines

Portrait of sequence torpedo Peter Sutcliffe, the Yorkshire Ripper, on his marriage day, eleven months prior to his debate of terror. Photograph: Express Newspapers/Getty Images

The sequence torpedo Peter Sutcliffe is looking a high justice statute to establish how most longer he contingency offer in jail. Sutcliffe, well well known as the Yorkshire Ripper, got twenty hold up conditions in 1981 for murdering thirteen women and aggressive 7 others.

The 63-year-old is right away asking the justice to accede to him a calculable sentence.

Sutcliffe, who is hold in Broadmoor high security psychiatric hospital, will have to convince the mental health examination judiciary that he no longer poises a risk prior to he can be authorised to ask for parole.

He initial lodged his ask in 2008 and stating restrictions on the box ensured he was usually referred to as P. However Mr Justice Mitting, sitting in the high justice in London, ruled that Sutcliffe, right away well well known as Peter Coonan, could be identified. "It is right away usual belligerent this is piece of the rapist routine and contingency thus ensue in the defendant"s own name. The press are at autocracy to inform the actuality that these record regard Peter Sutcliffe/Peter Coonan."

A decider recommended, at the time of the 1981 trial, that Sutcliffe offer a smallest of thirty years at the back of bars, that expires subsequent year. However Sutcliffe"s name was not on a Home Office list, published in 2006, of 35 murderers portion "whole life" sentences, and he was since no grave smallest sentence. Today"s rough conference at the high justice in London set out what form the tariff-setting conference should take, and what justification should be admitted.

Mitting was told there was new consultant justification on Sutcliffe"s state of mind, that could assistance his box for recover on licence. However the decider refused an focus on Sutcliffe"s interest for uninformed psychiatric justification to be certified as piece of the tariff-setting exercise, although, he said, it would be deliberate in propinquity to his control post-sentence.

When Sutcliffe is reviewed after this year, the sobriety of his crimes, either or not he has done "exceptional" swell in custody, the state of his mental health and any representations from him, his victims or their families, will be taken in to account.

The decider will have the energy to levy a clear series of years that Sutcliffe contingency serve, and could order that he spends the rest of his hold up in jail. Sutcliffe was convicted at the Old Bailey in London for the attempted murder of thirteen women, and on 7 counts of attempted murder, in Yorkshire, Greater Manchester and Lancashire. The former truck motorist pronounced he was on a "mission from God" to kill prostitutes – nonetheless not all of his victims were sex workers – and was dubbed the Yorkshire Ripper since he lame their bodies utilizing a hammer, a sensory screw motorist and a knife. In 1984 he was eliminated to Broadmoor from prison.

His hold up judgment equates to that, whatever the result of the price tag decision, he will usually be liberated if the authorities cruise he no longer poses a critical risk to the public.

Craig Kieswetter faces wily English examination after comparison call-up

John Westerby, Dhaka & , : {}

Shortly after he had determined himself in the England team, Kevin Pietersen underlined his joining to his adopted nation by carrying the 3 lions tattooed on his left arm. Craig Kieswetter does not share his new team-mates affinity for physique art, preferring instead to speak of his love for the country, the culture, the people that he grown on visits to the United Kingdom to outlay time with his mothers Scottish family.

For the diver who switches countries, it becomes piece of the pursuit to remonstrate people that your devotion is some-more than skin deep.

Kieswetter and Pietersen had breakfast together yesterday to plead the make a difference and the younger man was left in no disbelief that his Englishness, or miss of it, will be a repeated thesis as prolonged as he plays general cricket.

Its something Im going to have to be rebuilt for my total career, Kieswetter said. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but Im unapproachable to be an English chairman and Im unapproachable to be piece of the England side.

Related LinksEngland openers feel feverishness opposite PakistanBrave Lumb finishes Kieswetters excellent workKieswetter anticipating to infer competent success

The Somerset wicketkeeper-batsman, 22, finished his four-year gift duration last week, afterwards soon played a match-winning innings for the Lions opposite the comparison group in Abu Dhabi. Three days after he was whisked in to Englands patrol for the one-day leg of the debate to Bangladesh. Today he will open the batting in a 50-over diversion opposite a Bangladesh Cricket Board XI in Fatullah, only south of Dhaka, as England hope for for the three-match one-day array that starts on Sunday.

Kieswetters graduation has been so quick that yesterday he was wearing England precision pack borrowed from his team-mates.

Born and lifted in Johannesburg, with a Scottish mom and South African father, Kieswetter changed to England when he was eighteen after furloughed with his school, Bishops Diocesan College, and creation a clever sense when he played opposite Millfield in Somerset. Millfield asked either he would be meddlesome in receiving A levels there and, once he had accepted, it did not take prolonged for a stipulate suggest to arrive from Somerset.

In his early days at Somerset, Kieswetter spoke of the frustrations that players in South Africa felt with the share system, nonetheless he insisted yesterday that his move was not encouraged by cricketing governing body in his homeland. Perhaps he is aware that Pietersen never attempted to disguise his antipathy for the share complement and has been responding ungainly questions about it ever since.

Its never been a domestic thing or a share thing for me, Kieswetter pronounced yesterday. It was fundamentally that I lived here dual months of the year and I desired the place. Being innate with both passports put me in a advantageous position.

England are penetrating to take a closer see at Kieswetter prior to they name their 15-man patrol on Mar thirty for the World Twenty20, that starts a month later. He will open currently with Alastair Cook, but Matt Prior continues at the behind of the stumps. This equates to Kieswetter will have to field, something he has never finished for Somerset.

The fieldings fine, Ive been you do a little work with Richard Halsall [the England fielding coach] and well see how it goes, he said. I used to throw the pike behind in school, so my arms not as well bad. But Ill have to get my hands tougher or stronger up with a bit of catching.

He let trip that his personal most appropriate at the pike was an considerable 58 metres. Whatever your views on his origins, this is one gifted individual.

Striking gold

Born November 28, 1987 in JohannesburgFirst-class jot down 2,254 runs in 47 games, normal 40.25, strike-rate 62.16One-day 1,500 runs in 45 games, normal 39.47, strike-rate 88.60Twenty20 772 runs in 34 games, normal 30.88, strike-rate 130.18 Made 69 from 58 balls on his entrance for Somerset opposite Glamorgan in 2007 Hit 81 from 66 balls when England Lions kick England in a Twenty20 compare in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday