Alec Stewart says he reported to the England and Wales Cricket Board that he had been told Tim Bresnan, Stuart Broad and Graeme Swann all had access to a parody Kevin Pietersen Twitter account
Alec Stewart
London: Alec Stewart says he reported to the England and Wales Cricket Board that he had been told Tim Bresnan, Stuart Broad and Graeme Swann all had access to a parody Kevin Pietersen Twitter account.
Alec Stewart
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Stewart made the claims on Wednesday night, saying he was told by the account's owner, Richard Bailey, at a Test match in 2012.
The 'Kpgenius' account is a prominent topic in Pietersen's autobiography. Pietersen cites the account as one example of a culture of "bullying" inside the England dressing room.
Bailey is a cricket fan and a friend of Broad, but has always maintained he ran the account alone with no input from the dressing room, telling The Guardian on Wednesday: "They 100 per cent did not tweet from it."
Swann used his column in Wednesday's edition of The Sun to refute the claims, insisting that while he did follow it, he did not have a hand in running it.
That came after Pietersen's book told a story of Stewart claiming Bailey had confided in him that three members of the England team had access to the account.
Back in 2012...
Angered that his "integrity" had been questioned by Bailey's denial, Stewart told BBC Radio 5 Live: "The reason I am prepared to talk about is that he (Bailey) has said he didn't say anything to me and therefore is doubting my integrity and I won't have that.
"What happened, back in 2012 at the Oval, at the top tier of the OCS Stand at the Vauxhall End of the ground, this gentleman came up and said to me: 'I understand you follow the KPgenius twitter account'.
"I said 'yes, some of it is funny, some of it is close to the bone'. He then said 'that is me', I said 'very good, well done'. He then came back and said, 'can I keep a secret?', I said 'yes, but it depends what you're going to tell me'.
"He said 'I can't tell you' and then walked away. Thirty seconds later he came back and said 'three players have access to the account, they have the password' and he told me the three names.
"The names were Bresnan, Broad and Swann and it didn't sit comfortably with me. I then made Hugh Morris, and Andy Flower at a later date, aware of the conversation, passed on that information and left it at that."
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