Zak Crawley, Harry Brook and the value of logging off from social media

H ave you heard the one about the ballet critic and the dog poo? In February the Hanover State Opera’s ballet director Marco Goecke was so incensed by a bad review written by the Frankfurter Allgemeine ballet critic Wiebke Hüster that he tracked her down in public and smeared the excrement of Gustav, his 14-year-old dachshund, in her face. Now, I think we can all agree that as reactions to criticism go, it’s a bad one.

Goecke later described his attack on Hüster, with an astounding degree of understatement, as “certainly not super”. He also refused to apologise, describing his cack-handed actions as the result of years of “annihilatory criticism”. As excuses go, Marco, that one’s crap.

When I read this unfortunate and frankly mind-boggling fecal tale, it made me think of someone else who has been having an unpleasant time of it recently – Zak Crawley. For “annihilatory criticism”, Marco, try being a professional sportsperson who messes up. Try being a footballer who misses a crucial penalty or gives away a critical foul. In fact, try being any professional sportsperson in this age of social media and febrile fandom. Heck, try being an England cricketer out of nick with the Ashes looming. Try being Zak Crawley.

Crawley’s entire 33-Test career has been played out under a question mark. Picked on promise rather than weight of runs, the nagging feeling is that he has been cosseted from the get-go, that he was the favourite of the former selector Ed Smith and is very much the pet project of the current managing director, Rob Key. Crawley is the cricketing Tamagotchi passed between the pockets of the two men who keep the teamsheet – he’s been given and greedily gobbled up too many chances that weren’t afforded others with