The anger of the jilted sportsman is a tale as old as the English batting collapse. And as Liam Livingstone’s latest outburst confirms, anger isn’t always accompanied by clarity.
Livingstone’s fall from international favour looks, at first glance, dizzying. He captained England as recently as late 2024, scoring a superb 124 not out off 85 balls to win a one-day international against West Indies in Antigua.
The selectors recognised his talent, accorded him the highest honour in the game, and gave him plenty of opportunity to prove himself. They wanted him to succeed. Why wouldn’t they? Their reputation was on the line too.
But Livingstone’s next 15 white-ball innings for his country produced 234 runs at an average of 16, culminating in 33 in three knocks during England’s disastrous Champions Trophy campaign in Pakistan just over a year ago. Had the selectors ignored that sequence, they would doubtless have been accused of operating a closed shop.
Now, before heading off to India for the IPL, Livingstone has revisited his grievance with the regime of Rob Key and Brendon McCullum, telling ESPN Cricinfo: ‘If you’re in, you’re in, and if you’re not in, no one cares about you.’
Key, says Livingstone, told him he had ‘100 more important things to do than speak to you’. And he describes the management’s response to his struggles in apparently damning terms: ‘I was asking for help and pretty much all I got was that I care too much and I need to chill out a little bit, and everything will take care of itself.’
Liam Livingstone captained England as recently as late 2024, scoring a superb 124 not out off 85 balls against West Indies in Antigua – but his fall from grace has been rapid
Coach Marcus Trescothick congratulates Livingstone for a match-winning knock in the Caribbean but the batsman has had mixed relationships with the England hierarchy
Livingstone calls the Champions Trophy, where England finished bottom of their group after defeats by Australia, Afghanistan and South Africa, ‘the worst experience I’ve had playing cricket’.
Asked about England’s recent performance at the T20 World Cup, where they came within eight runs of reaching the final, he sounds suspiciously like he is protesting too much: ‘I didn’t miss it one bit. There wasn’t any part of me that was wishing I was playing in that team, to be honest.’
For those seeking more ammunition to bash England after the disastrous Ashes, his broadside is a gift, depicting the dressing room as cliquey, self-absorbed and amateurish. There is no doubt McCullum got plenty wrong in Australia, and it is reasonable to argue he is lucky still to be in the job.
But his modus operandi is no secret, and it is definitely not callous. When he sees a talented cricketer whose intensity he believes is holding him back, he attempts to ease the pressure: ‘Chill out’ might be depicted as helpful advice as easily as Livingstone regards it as indifference.
Then there are the cases of Sam Curran and Will Jacks. Curran reacted to being left out of England’s white-ball set-up by arranging lunch with McCullum, over which the two men discussed his potential route back in, with fruitful consequences.
Jacks, meanwhile, embraced the role that Livingstone came to resent, scoring crucial runs at No 7 and bowling useful overs of back-up spin. Crucially, Jacks never moaned, and ended up winning four player of the match awards at the World Cup.
Livingstone believes he is still ‘one of the best players in white-ball cricket in England’. At his best, it’s true, he can be electric. But 39 ODIs have produced a batting average of 31, and 60 T20s an average of 25. In all, 83 white-ball innings have yielded eight scores of 50; a total of 58 wickets do not make an unanswerable case either. If his career so far can be summed up by a single adjective, it might be ‘unfulfilled’.
According to Livingstone, England boss Rob Key told him he had ‘100 more important things to do than speak to you’
After 39 ODIs, Livingstone has a batting average of 31 and after 60 T20s an average of 25
It needn’t remain that way. Livingstone was mentioned around the selection table when the squad was picked for the limited-overs trip to Sri Lanka before the World Cup, and – at 32 – has time to play for England again.
But self-pity is not an attractive quality, especially when a whole year has passed, and Livingstone might do well to remember that McCullum once thought him so well suited to his approach that, to widespread consternation, he handed him a Test cap in Pakistan, where a knee injury cut the experiment short.
There are usually two sides to every story. It will be to Livingstone’s detriment if he engages only with one of them.
