Johnson at Heart of Mediocrity Scandal

With several urgent issues facing the capital requiring intervention by struggling Tory Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, many Londoners were stunned to see that Mr Johnson found time to jump on the sporting bandwagon and issue a press release congratulating the England cricket team for their victory in the 2009 Ashes series.

The choice of cricketers Mr Johnson chose to highlight has sparked more controversy. A regular user of the Blackwall Tunnel told us "Singling out Andrew Flintoff and Monty Panesar as persons to inspire young people is bizarre showing Mr Johnson's detachment from reality and lack of attention to detail. Flintoff is more famous for his drinking activities off the pitch than his statistically mediocre test career and woeful record as England captain. Panesar failed to achieve even the heights of mediocrity in the latest Ashes series, playing one match, scoring 11 runs, and taking 1 wicket at a cost of 115 runs. Surely Mr Johnson could find better than mediocre role models to inspire the capital's young. Sadly, this is symptomatic of Mr Johnson's lack of vision, allowing the capital to aspire to mediocrity and not the greatness always encouraged by his predecessor as Mayor of London".

Further frustration at Mr Johnson's comments were expressed by another regular user of the Blackwall Tunnel and resident of the leafy, opulent outer London Brorough of Bexley who told us "I had the misfortune to be in Bexleyheath on a Friday evening recently and can confirm that I saw too many young men apparently inspired by and trying to emulate the drinking feats of Andrew Flintoff. Mr Johnson should be condemning the binge drinking culture and not encouraging it with his curious choice of role models".