The Curious Case of Craig Kieswetter

For the upcoming tour of New Zealand, England have once again changed their white ball wicket-keeper. For long time England fans this isn't anything new, since the 2001 tour of India when Alec Stewart chose not to go due to safety concerns, England have seemingly changed their ODI wicket-keeper with free abandon. In that time, England have been through Alec Stewart, Chris Read, James Foster, Geraint Jones, Phil Nixon, Matt Prior, Tim Ambrose, Phil Mustard, Steven Davies, Craig Kieswetter and now Jos Buttler. This list doesn't even include the brief experiments with Marcus Trescothick and Eoin Morgan. 

Kieswetter is the latest player to have been tried, deemed to have failed, and sent back to county cricket to re-learn his trade. I am happy to admit that I am no fan of Kieswetter, and was a firm advocate of dropping him for Buttler, but a closer look at Kieswetter's career shows just how hard it is going to be for Buttler (or Jonny Bairstow) to nail down this position.

With the gloves, Kieswetter averages just short of 29 at a strike rate of 90. Those don't sound amazing figures, but of the ten keepers mentioned above (ignoring Buttler) that's good enough for 3rd for both average and strike rate (behind Stewart and Davies, and Davies and Mustard). Whilst his keeping is often maligned, his bye/dismissal ratio is a match for anyone on this list.

So why has he been dropped? Well, firstly it's no surprise. Forced out of the T20 side by Buttler in October, many felt that Kieswetter was merely keeping the gloves warm. The only debate was whether to replace him with Buttler, or bring back Matt Prior. Yet whilst Kieswetter both keeps and bats ahead of Buttler when they play together for Somerset, Prior averages significantly less than Kieswetter and scores his runs significantly slower. 

England's and Kieswetter's problems may simply be that the standard for an international white ball keeper has been set too high. Over the last decade, firstly Adam Gilchrist re-defined what it meant to be a wicket-keeper/batsman, and in ODI cricket, MS Dhoni has taken that even further. Dhoni is not just the keeper, he is the key wicket to beat India. Every ODI against India this winter the message has been clear - "Got to get Dhoni early"

Now, it seems the model for every side is either to try and find a Gilchrist, or a Dhoni. So many keepers can be used as evidence, but one of the best examples is the use of 20-year-old Quinton de Kock in the ODI series between South Africa and New Zealand. Bought in for his debut, de Kock was not given a chance to learn at seven. He was expected to open.

My last thought on this - Mark Boucher is rightly regarded as one of the finest wicket-keepers in international history, and has 295 ODI caps to his credit. His stats? An average of 28 at a strike rate of 85. Matthew Wade, the new Australian wicket-keeping hope who most feel has started his career promisingly? He's averaging 22 at a rate of 67.

I'm not saying Kieswetter is better than Boucher, but simply showing that the standard for an international keeper has reached dizzying heights. Good luck Jos, you're going to need it.