Kevin Pietersen calls it a day
The South African Born, English cricketer recently said goodbye to his cricketing career. The luminary
hinted his retirement by a tweet after Quetta Gladiators lost against Islamabad United by 6 wickets. A
day later KP confirmed it by stating that he wants to use his remaining energy on saving the endangered
rhinos from extinction.
The significance of KP can be understood by Harsha Bhogle’s statement: “KP was born for big stage… a
player who defined his generation”. But this big stage layer saw abundant ebbs and flows in his life and those incidents revolved his life: from urinating on the Lord’s pitch in 2013 to donating his life for rhinos shows his personality’s transition.
The 37 year old also holds the prestige of being second highest run-scorer for England across all the
formats following Alastair Cook. The extrovert and flamboyant player was sacked after England’s
disastrous loss against the 2013-14 Ashes series. He never represented England in international cricket
again. However, the legend pursued his interest by playing County Cricket and T20 leagues across the
globe (Big Bash, CPL, IPL, and PSL).
The unsung hero never let any huddle mute his passion for cricket. KP indeed defines the cricket of his
era, from playing the innovative helicopter short in BBL to accepting the blind folded 6 challenge, e was
exceptionally maverick and challenged himself throughout his career.
Pietersen came with a fearless approach to target some of the world’s best bowlers all over the ground.
When KP went a step ahead of the reverse sweep to hit Murlitharan for six over long off, the telegraph
said he had “broken new ground”.
Pietersen was indeed amongst the stars of his time, his resilience can be referred to the 2012 match
where South Africa totaled 419 in an innings and in return England were 85-2 when he walked in.
Pietersen batted responsibly, scoring 149 with England ending up at 425. In the same year KP scored an
amazing 186 runs on the spinning tracks of Mumbai and formed a 206 run partnership with Alastair
Cook. During the span of 2011-12 he was at his peaks, scoring almost 3000 runs in those 2 years.
Andrew Strauss who captained England in all formats said Pietersen was “the best England player that I
played with”. But it was the same captain that Pietersen fell out with over the famed “textgate”. By
sending some texts, allegedly critical of the captain, to an unnamed South African player during a series
in 2012, Pietersen earned Strauss’s displeasure permanently. As 2014 turned on the calendar, he went
off the team. The doors of English Cricket would be closed on KP forever, especially after Strauss took
over as Cricket director in 2015