KP and England need each other

At the end of an incredible day for English cricket, the only semblance of sanity came in the identity of the man who has been given the duty of reuniting a fractured and embarrassed squad, and leading them to the Caribbean in just under a fortnight's time.

Andrew Strauss is precisely the sort of rational, unflappable character that the country needs right now, a conciliatory cricketer whose finest performances invariably take place right in the eye of the storm. If Chennai was perceived to be his finest hour, it's nothing compared to the innings he has to play right now.

In a parallel universe, Strauss might already be three years into his tenure as England captain - in 2006 he performed the role with distinction only for Andrew Flintoff to reclaim the leadership to disastrous effect for that winter's Ashes; and how different might the landscape look now had Strauss been trusted to take on that challenge? Instead, at the age of 31, Strauss has been given a rare second opportunity, though not even the most ambitious of cricketers would envy the circumstances in which his chance has arisen.

It's hard to recall a more needless and self-immolating row than the one that has escalated in the space of eight days, from a gentle spark on New Year's Eve to the rampant bushfire that consumed England's captain and coach on Wednesday. For the ECB's director of England cricket, Hugh Morris, to declare that it would have been "impossible to restore dressing-room unity" without the removal of both Kevin Pietersen and Peter Moores, is staggering evidence of England's current dysfunction.

Strauss' last act as captain, as it happens, came in August 2006, when he looked down from the Oval pavilion with wry bemusement as Pakistan's cricketers tore themselves asunder in the aftermath of the Darrell Hair ball-tampering furore. He could not have imagined then that his next spell at the helm would coincide with a saga that makes Pakistan's habitual infighting look like a gentle bout of fraternal sparring. English cricket always imagined itself to be above such squabbles. Instead it has set a new benchmark for internecine strife.

His immediate task will be to lance the boils of discontent that have erupted this week, and find a way for the various factions within his dressing room to cooperate. It promises to be a harder job than the day-to-day business of playing and winning Test matches, although if Pietersen himself is true to the words he laid out in his resignation statement, and takes his place back in the ranks with good grace and humility, the healing process will be that much more manageable.

That prospect might not be as big an "if" as it seems. Pietersen remains indispensable to England's cause, but more importantly, England remains indispensable to his. It was widely feared - not least, one suspects, by his employers - that Pietersen might simply flounce out of the country, and straight into the welcoming embrace of Lalit Modi and the IPL, if he was denied his demands. Pietersen's central contract remains unsigned, and up until yesterday his stock in the world game had never been higher, particularly in India, following his remarkable switch-hitting century in Mohali and his pivotal role in the negotiations that ensured last month's Test series went ahead as planned in the wake of the Mumbai attacks.

But what Pietersen failed to factor into last week's dramatic power-grab was the importance of Test cricket to his own brand value. Perhaps more acutely than fame, fortune or glory, he simply seeks acceptance, preferably on his terms. When, after the Lord's crowd had stood to acclaim his emotional maiden century against South Africa last summer, Pietersen told the press that he had "never felt so loved", and though the words sound a bit icky on a flat sheet of paper, the sparkle of contentment in his eyes told you this was not a man milking the moment but a sportsman approaching fulfilment.

Similarly, the love that was in the air during Pietersen's maiden Test as captain, at The Oval in August, had to be sampled to be believed. The dressing room hummed with good vibes and incoming text messages as the new captain lavished praise on his charges and coaxed match-winning performances from, among others, that "beautiful, cynical little man" Steve Harmison. The doubts did linger about Pietersen's methods - when Harmison was dropped only two Tests later, in Mohali, the lavish praise was made to look a little premature, but nevertheless Pietersen's success in coaxing him out of one-day retirement, and then back to India as part of a full 15-man squad in the aftermath of the Mumbai attacks, was taken as proof of the captain's popularity - not least by the man himself.

But then, one by one, the dissenters came trundling into view. Flintoff is the best barometer of dressing-room well-being, and his distaste for Pietersen's methods became an open secret, but Harmison was the first to break ranks, baldly suggesting that Pietersen's attack on Moores was an attack on team unity. When Morris' canvassing of opinion in the dressing room revealed a widespread distaste for his actions, Pietersen was propelled into a genuine state of shock.

The ECB called his bluff superbly this week, though I doubt it was a conscious strategy on the part of the board, which was simply nonplussed at the notion of one of its employees pulling the strings. The ECB sanctioned him because of the precedent his insurrection threatened to set, but in the eight-hour hiatus between the initial reports of his resignation on Wednesday morning and the final confirmation at 5pm, the realisation dawned that he had made a staggering miscalculation.

On Tuesday afternoon, as his safari holiday in South Africa drew to a close, Pietersen believed - with good reason - that his every whim had been catered for. Moores' departure, by all accounts, was merely days away (that part, at least, turned out to be true), and KP was being talked up as the most powerful England captain that had ever walked the earth. How swiftly the scenario has changed.

Pietersen has never undergone such a public humiliation, although England must desperately hope and pray that this intimation of mortality does not rupture his superhuman confidence. Opposition bowlers and close catchers will have an endless supply of jibes with which to taunt him in the coming contests, and one of Strauss' first roles, ironically, will be to re-inflate the ego of a man who most of the dressing room clearly felt needed taking down a peg or two. Without Pietersen at his best, the Ashes will not be coming home this summer.

But at least Moores has gone, and the subtle distinction between the captain's resignation and the coach's sacking might provide Pietersen with a small amount of succour. He has, after all, got what he wanted, and engineered the removal of a man he believed was not up to the job, even if his determination to do what he thought was necessary cost him a job he dearly cherished. That's the way he must look at it, at any rate. It's tough on Moores to be regarded as collateral damage, but if Pietersen spends the rest of the year demonstrating that he was right all along, there may yet be a way for England to emerge from this crisis with their dignity stitched back together.