His father is Afrikaner, but importantly his mother Penny is English. It was this link to the mother country that breathed life into his rather stagnating career and enabled him to play international cricket
His early days were spent as an off-spinner who could hit the ball rather hard from the lower order of Natal’s B team. Nasser Hussain later remembered this rookie off-spinner, who had taken four wickets and scored 61 runs for KwaZulu Natal against the touring England side in 1999.
The persuasion to migrate to England came from his omission from the Natal first team due to political reasons. There was the infamous quota for coloured cricketers, and a young off-spinning batsman by the name of Ghulam Bodi was chosen in his place. On becoming aware of this, he flung a bottle across the Natal dressing room and shouted, “I’m leaving.”
This coincided with the offer from Clive Rice, who had once selected him for South Africa Schools. Rice, the coach of Nottinghamshire, invited him to join the cricket team of the county.
He made a last attempt to continue his career in South Africa, even though his mentors and well-wishers, including South African captain Shaun Pollock, advised him to try his luck in Blighty. Coach Graham Ford arranged a meeting with Dr Ali Bacher, the most powerful man of South African cricket. Pietersen flew to Johannesburg with his father to meet the supremo of United Cricket Board of South Africa (UCBSA).
In his autobiography, he writes: “Bacher was rude to me in that meeting, and rude to my dad … It was like he was trying to show his authority over us straight away…. [he] said soon the quota system would stop and that selection would go back to being on merit. So I said, ‘Dr Bacher, does that mean that, say next year, if the black and coloured players are not good enough, will Natal field an all-white side?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘They will be good enough and will play.’”
It was this moment that decided the future. He made his way to England and started playing for Nottinghamshire, on a three-year contract from 2001.
In 2005, England needing to bat out the final day to regain The Ashes, he scored 158 with 15 fours and 7 sixes, off 187 balls. No common cricketer could save a Test with that sort of batting. He did.
As he walked back the stadium full of Englishmen, perhaps till then wary of a radical South African with streaks of highlight in his rockstar hair, rose as one to applaud him all the way to the pavilion. Shane Warne ran down from the slip and whispered into the ears of his dear friend, “Savour this moment.”
Kevin Pietersen did. He had performed his job, and as was his way he partied hard.
He ended with more than 8000 runs in Test cricket at an average of 47, with 23 hundreds. Runs that could have been scored for South Africa. Runs that made him one of the greatest batsmen to play for England.
Kevin Pietersen was born on 27 June 1980.