David Leggat: Ranting tweets send a garbled message

England batsman Kevin Pietersen voiced his displeasure on his Twitter page recently after being overlooked by the selectors. Photo / Getty Images

Opinion

Memo sports bosses: beware your light-fingered stars. Those whose digits trip across their cellphone keypads rather faster than their brain drops into gear.

England players Kevin Pietersen and Dimitri Mascarenhas have been revealed as the latest couple of first-class twits and fined accordingly for voicing their displeasure on their Twitter pages at recently being overlooked by the selectors.

Not long ago Pietersen was England's batting hero, but he has lost his way to the extent he was dropped for the limited-overs games against Pakistan.

His reaction? "Done for rest of summer!! Man of the World Cup T20, and dropped from the T20 side too. It's a f***-up ..." he told readers of his Twitter feed a few hours before the England squad was named.

That was worth an estimated £1500 fine ($3203) from the England and Wales Cricket Board this week.

Mascarenhas, the big-hitting limited-overs specialist, and Otago import two seasons ago, took exception to chief selector Geoff Miller.

"Chairman of selectors came and didn't even come say hi. What a prick ... Doesn't take much to say hello does it?? ... Geoff miller [sic] is a complete knob. He had no clue what he is doing. f****** prick."

His Hampshire county has lightened his wallet by £1000.

Both apologised, Pietersen to anyone who'd listen, Mascarenhas to former international Miller specifically, which brings stable doors and bolting horses to mind.

They are not the first and certainly won't be the last to run foul of the (anti-) social networking site. Yesterday Australia's triple Olympic swimming gold medallist Stephanie Rice lost her Jaguar XF sports car and a deal with the company after tweeting "Suck on that faggots!" after the Wallabies beat South Africa in the Tri-Nations test at the weekend.

Openly gay former league international Ian Roberts led the condemnation, calling her "an idiot".

While Rice's remarks are ugly and homophobic, the cricketers' handiwork is plain dumb.

So why do they do it? Is it a spur of the moment rant, or something that is a carefully prepared venting of spleen? Probably a mix.

Pietersen claimed, as you would, that "it came out in the way that I didn't want it to come out. It wasn't meant for the public domain."

That begs another question altogether: does Pietersen know the difference between a tweet and a text?

Mascarenhas claimed the comments don't "reflect my true views on Mr Miller".

You might beg to differ on the evidence, but Mascarenhas said he posted his comments at 3.30am "after a good night", and he wasn't referring to a late-night prayer vigil.

Tweeters are all around us. Disgraced England striker Wayne Rooney's cousin was on the job this week.

After newspaper allegations that Rooney had bedded a prostitute last year while his wife was pregnant, his cousin tweeted the world: "My heart goes out to poor Coleen. At least it weren't a granny this time, though."