WE JUST HAD TO LEAVE HALES OUT OF THE WORLD CUP...HIS INCLUSION WOULD HAVE CREATED TOO MUCH OF A DISTRACTION

ONE player who missed out on World Cup selection was Alex Hales. The rest of us were truly taken aback when we found out he was missing some cricket, citing personal reasons.

It was subsequently reported in the press that his absence was due to a 21-day suspension for failing two recreational drugs tests.

The group of senior players within the squad had no idea he had been suspended because the ECB’s rules require it to keep such suspensions confidential. It was soon clear that I was not the only one questioning how we had not known anything about it.

It was not that any of us wanted to pry into the troubles of one of our team-mates. Rather, it was Alex, as an individual, had not felt able to share his struggles with a group he’d spent so much time with, in a team environment over the past few years, that bothered us. We had been a tight-knit team throughout Eoin Morgan’s captaincy period and so reading the finer details in a newspaper was not a great way for us all to find out. Morgan made it his business to seek out the senior players within the squad to canvas their views as to what should be done about Alex’s situation. When asked directly what I would do, I came straight out with it: ‘No. I can’t have him in the squad’.

I was speaking as someone with first-hand knowledge of what it’s like when an off-field issue is hanging over a team.

I went into all the details about my experience of what happened on the 201718 tour of Australia and posed the question as to whether Hales (right) was the level of player we could make an exception for.

Was he so indispensable that he was worth keeping in the squad, no matter the sideshow that might ensue? No. This was the resounding response from myself and other senior players.

We were within sight of the prize we’d worked so hard for and wanted our heads to be on winning the World Cup, not thinking about other issues. What was bigger? What was more important? In the end, it came down to us protecting the culture and environment we had built. A World Cup only comes around every four years and retaining Alex as a squad player would have proved too much of a distraction.

You don’t need an issue that draws extra attention hanging around a team for weeks.

I know this from personal experience. I didn’t like it when I was the one who was the focus of such attention in the aftermath of the Bristol incident that contributed to me missing the last away Ashes.

The thing I hated most throughout that period was how other players were constantly being asked questions about me. That upset me.

There are only so many times you can see your team-mates having to answer questions that they really shouldn’t have to, and don’t know much about, before it really starts getting to you.

I was left wondering when it was all going to stop. Unfortunately, it would have been a similar case if Alex had been in our World Cup squad.