editorial comment Snorting between the lines, it seems clear that drugs have nothing to do with him quitting....

CHANNEL FOUR cricket commentator Dermot Reeve has quit his job because of his addiction to cocaine. The former England Test and one-day player and Warwickshire captain said that his drug-taking had wrecked his marriage and his commentating career.

“I turned to cocaine as a bit of escapism,” he said. “It was a quick fix to solve problems, as opposed to dealing with them.

“At first it was just once a month but as my marriage problems increased I used it more to escape.”

Reeve said the problem became so out of control that he was on cocaine while commentating on the first Test between England and New Zealand at Lord’s last summer. “I have no recollection of seeing a ball bowled on the Saturday or Sunday,” he said. He spent £200 per week on his addiction and walked out on his wife in Australia.

He has resigned from his television job shortly before England’s first Test of the summer in a bid to give up cocaine and work at his marriage. “I want to be clean and healthy and if I need professional help I will seek it,” he said.

Reeve said that recreational drugs were being offered openly to young players and he appealed to cricket officials to offer more support to players who tested positive for non-performance-enhancing drugs.

Warwickshire wicketkeeper Keith Piper is awaiting punishment after testing positive for cannabis last month and teammate Graham Wagg was banned for 15-months last October after testing positive for cocaine.

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