We told you so

Well, didn't we?

Andrew Flintoff is flying home after three IPL games in South Africa with a knee injury to have an operation that will keep him out for between three and five weeks. He will miss the Test and one-day series against West Indies and will not return to international cricket until the World Twenty-20 in June.

We all guessed it would happen.

Flintoff, 15st and 6ft4in, never holds back, He has had more operations in recent years than any star cricketer and at the start of the Ashes summer it was madness to allow him to play in the IPL, however many dollars it would bring him.

Whose fault is it? Today the blame is being shifted faster than a Flintoff bouncer

You may have thought that, as players like Flintoff, Pietersen and Collingwood have watertight contracts they could not possibly fit a trip to South African into the tiny break between the return from the Caribbean and the start of our summer.

You may have been foolish enough to think the ECB's officials would have stamped their well-shod feet and said: "Don't be silly. You need the rest and a steady build-up to the Ashes."

The Board would have been praised to the skies if they had been strong enough to resist. Cast your mind back to September 2005 when the nation responded to the team success with greater gusto than at any time since the Botham era.

Now it looks as if there will be no reason to celebrate and in the meantime we will keep our fingers crossed that this Flintoff injury can be sorted.

If I was a conspiracy theorist I might even wonder if they let him go because they suspected he would not stay fit for the five Tests against Australia. I'm not and my fingers will be crossed just like every other cricket lover's.