Moores: Sticking by skipper

England v New Zealand
Watch the fifth match of the NatWest Series LIVE on Sky Sports 1 from 10.30am on Saturday, or join skysports.com for over-by-over commentary

Related links

Teams

• England
• New Zealand

Players

• Paul Collingwood

Also see

• Play Fantasy Cricket
• Sky Sports experts
• Live scores

England coach Peter Moores has jumped to the defence of Paul Collingwood's leadership credentials following his four-match suspension.

Kevin Pietersen, 28 today, will captain England for the first time against New Zealand at Lord's on Saturday after Collingwood became the first English player to be banned by the International Cricket Council.

The Durham all-rounder will miss four limit-overs internationals as punishment for England being three overs behind the clock in the controversial one-wicket defeat to the Black Caps on Wednesday.

Collingwood's decision not to withdraw an appeal which resulted in Grant Elliott being run out towards the end of the chase led to a drastic deterioration of relations between the teams - before an apology to the tourists restored peace.

However, despite the incident, Moores believes his one-day skipper's image and future prospects have not been sullied by his initial actions.

Unfortunate

"No, I don't think it's damaged his captaincy," Moores said. "I think the fact he was then prepared to walk into their dressing room straight away and say 'listen fellas, I'm sorry, I don't think I got it right' says something for him.

"It takes quite a big bloke to do that. It was an incident which was unfortunate - in the heat of the battle he did it and the judgement call was it was legit.

"When someone gets picked for England, you pick them because they're made of the right stuff and they uphold the game.

"Paul has done that. We've watched him play a lot for England and we have admired his determination, his grit and the way he goes about his cricket.

"I back him because things happen in sport which you don't plan for and that is one of those things - and sometimes one of the keys is what happens after it happens.

As captain Collingwood took ultimate responsibility in the Elliott incident, although other senior players could have advised him to reprieve their opponent during the minutes in which he received treatment to his bruised thigh.

Reflect

But Moores said: "In situations like that it is all very fraught, they have been at it all day, they have been at it for three months or whatever, it is getting very tight and whatever decision is made out there, the group think the same.

"It is just 'yeah it's right, let's do it' - bang. That is how sport happens - decisions are made in snap seconds and then it is done.

"It seems like forever when you watch from the side but when you're in there it's all going off.

"Afterwards you get a bit of time to reflect and the key then is do you think you made the right one or not?

"One thing we want to make sure is that nobody thinks we want in any way to devalue the game of cricket itself."

Despite accusations of gamesmanship from the tourists during the heated finale to New Zealand's last-ball triumph, Moores maintains his team have not crossed the line on fair play.

"I think we've played our cricket fairly all the way through," he insisted. "You should judge somebody by how they go about their game and I think we have seen the England team play their cricket within the spirit of the game. They do.

"We have seen that all the way along through the series and I don't see anything different in that.

"It will be the same when we pitch up on Saturday at Lord's."