Kevin Pietersen

Kevin Pietersen

Kevin Peter Pietersen, MBE (born 27 June 1980) is a South African-born English cricketer. He is a right-handed batsman and occasional off spin bowler who plays for England, Surrey and the Delhi Daredevils.

Pietersen was born in Pietermaritzburg, Natal Province, South Africa. He made his first-class debut for Natal in 1997 before moving to England, after voicing his displeasure at the racial quota system in place in South Africa. His English mother made him eligible to play for England and after serving a qualifying period of four years playing at county level, he was called up almost immediately into the national side. He made his international debut in the One Day International match against Zimbabwe in 2004 and his Test match debut in the 2005 Ashes series against Australia the following year.

The England team's subsequent reliance on Pietersen resulted in only a single first-class appearance for Hampshire between 2005 and 2010. On 17 June 2010, Pietersen announced his wish to leave Hampshire and he subsequently joined Surrey on loan for the remainder of the season before joining the club permanently from the 2011 season onwards.

He was captain of the England Test and ODI teams from 4 August 2008 to 7 January 2009 but resigned after just three Tests and nine ODIs, following a dispute with England coach Peter Moores, who was sacked the same day. His relationship with the ECB never fully recovered. This came to a head in 2012 when, after a disagreement over his schedule, Pietersen annouced his retirement from all forms of international limited-overs cricket on 31 May. Although he later retracted his retirement, his relationship with both the ECB and his team-mates soured during the series against South Africa and he was dropped for the final Test of that series.

On 24 August 2012, ESPN STAR Sports (ESS) confirmed that Pietersen will join their commentary team for presentation and analysis during the ICC World T20 tournament in Sri Lanka that starts on 18 September.

In October 2012, ECB confirmed that agreement has been reached concerning a process for his re-integration into the England team during the remainder of 2012 and that upon completion of the programme, the England selectors will consider him for future matches. On October 18, 2012, England selectors added him to the Test squad as its 17th member for the forthcoming tour of India.

Pietersen became the fastest batsman to reach both 1,000 and 2,000 runs in One Day International cricket He has the second-highest run total from his first 25 Tests, behind only the Australian Donald Bradman, and was the fastest player, in terms of days, to reach 4,000, 5,000 and 7,000 Test runs. He became only the third English batsman to top the ICC One Day International rankings, doing so in March 2007. In July 2008, after a century against South Africa, The Times called him "the most complete batsman in cricket" and in 2012 The Guardian called him "England's greatest modern batsman".