The team that turned down Kevin Pietersen
Kevin Pietersen first came to British attention when, as a teenager, he hit 61 and took four for 141 against England on their 1999/2000 tour of South Africa. The following summer, he helped Cannock to win the Birmingham League and had his first trial with an English county – playing for Warwickshire’s second XI against Surrey in a drawn three -day game at Leamington Spa. Pietersen hit an unbeaten 92 – but Warwickshire never asked him back…
Jamie Fleet (Cannock team mate): I wouldn’t say he struck me as a world beater. He was clearly a good player and took his cricket very seriously, but most overseas players are like that. He was part of a good Cannock side. He scored 485 runs in 13 innings and took 16 wickets at 25 in the Birmingham League. I think we recommended him for the Midland Cricket Conference side, but not to Warwickshire. He was recommended to us at Cannock by Doug Watson, the South African batsman we signed as our pro in the mid-90s. Nasser Hussain was keen to get him playing club cricket in Essex at the same time.
Steve Perryman (Warwickshire coach): We were after an off-spinner, really. We were looking at a long-term replacement for Neil Smith, who was coming towards the end of an excellent career. The way Kevin was sold to us, we were expecting a bowler who batted a bit.
JF: He was always more of a batsman. He had just scored 50 [61 not out in 57 balls with four sixes] against the England touring team [a side that included Andy Caddick, Alex Tudor, Andy Flintoff and Phil Tufnell] when we signed him…
Gareth Batty (Surrey’s captain for that game): It was the first time I had come across him. He didn’t make much impression with the ball. But I remember him quite clearly with the bat. The conditions were bowler friendly and Carl Greenidge bowled really well, and pretty quickly too. All their batsmen struggled. All except one.
SP: He batted exactly the way he bats now. He put bat to ball and played very well. He was impressive.
Tony Frost (Warwickshire’s keeper in the game): The thing I remember most was his confidence. He had a hell of a lot of belief in his own ability.
GB: Carl dropped one slightly short and KP hooked it miles over square leg. It was a massive shot. It flew out of the ground, over some trees and knocked the tiles off the roof of a house. It made us all sit up. He played really well in difficult conditions. It was clear that he was one to watch.
TF: He hit it hard and he hit it a long way. One six was massive. He batted very well. I can’t remember a thing about his bowling though.
SP: I wouldn’t say we rejected him at all.
We invited him to play another game for the
seconds, but by then he was a long way down the road to signing with Notts.
His agent basically said to us, “Right, you either have to make him an offer now or he’s going to sign for another county.” We thought about it, but weren’t prepared to be rushed into a decision.
John Morris (former England, Derbyshire, Notts and Durham batsman; then KP’s agent): Warwickshire had first refusal over Kevin. That’s a fact. I met with Dennis Amiss and Bob Woolmer and came away with the impression that they weren’t interested in Kevin. Even before I was involved I believe the television presenter Nick Owen suggested to Warwickshire that Kevin was worth a look.
Nick Owen (television presenter): I saw him playing for Cannock in the Birmingham League. He hit 100 against my son’s side, Harborne, and I remember thinking what an amazing player he was. I actually recommended him to Colin Wells at Derbyshire. They had a look at him but weren’t interested. That’s a shame, because he would have been great value at the time.
TF: Not for a minute did I think he would go on to become the player he has. Nobody did. He’s improved a hell of a lot.
SP: When you see how it’s worked out for him, it’s fair to say he would win a place in any team. He’s a fine player. But we had several exciting young batsmen coming through at the time – guys like Mark Wagh, Ian Bell and Jim Troughton – and had we signed Kevin, it might well have blocked their progress. Who knows? A bit later Jonathan Trott came along in similar circumstances. But we knew he was primarily a batsman and he forced his way onto the staff by scoring an unbeaten double century in his first second XI game.
JM: Warwickshire are trying to cover themselves. They would, wouldn’t they? They passed up the opportunity to sign a top player. Derbyshire were also offered a look, but after Kevin had seen Trent Bridge, that’s where he wanted to play. He was keen to work with Clive Rice, too.
SP: Neil Smith has been a hard guy to replace. I think in the end we signed Gavin Franklin that year. Looking at Pietersen’s bowling, you couldn’t really say that was a mistake. I’m not sure how seriously he takes his bowling now. He’s had such success with the bat that he probably hasn’t had to work on the bowling as much as he might have done.
JM: I got the impression that it was because Neil Smith was at the club that they didn’t want Kevin. Neil was an off-spinning all-rounder and so was Kevin. The club may have been looking at a long-term replacement for Smith, but I’m not sure he was thinking the same way.
SP: Kevin was certainly a confident guy. He made his presence felt, put it like that. But there were no problems in the dressing room. He was fine.
JF: He was never a problem. He wanted to bowl more, but we had Laurie Potter in the side, and he bowled quite a few overs of left-arm spin. Kevin’s bowling opportunities were a bit limited and there were a few conversations about that. But he didn’t fall out with anybody. He keeps in touch with lads at the club and we’re proud of the role we played in his development.
JM: There’s no animosity between me and Kevin. I was disappointed when he jumped ship – and the way he jumped ship – after I’d negotiated his first two contracts at Notts, but I guess that’s the sort of character he is. But I don’t think that his character had any bearing on Warwickshire’s decision. He’s a top player.
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It is common knowledge that Kevin Pietersen was turned down by Warwickshire. However, what has always been surrounded in mystery and/or conjecture, was who made the decision not to call him back. For sometime now, I believe that the wrong person has carried the can for that decision.
Steve Perryman was the man left to carry the can but it is my belief that the decision, rightly or wrongly, could only have been made by one man – the incumbent Director of Cricket, Bob Woolmer.
Bob, based in South Africa, would have not only been aware of Kevin Pietersen’s ability and temprament but also have come in contactt with KP during his early cricket development. For whatever reason, Bob would have been the man to decide that KP was not the guy for Warwickshire at that time. That I believe is confirmed by John Morris’ statement that he met with Dennis Amiss and Bob and came away with the viewpoint that Warwickshire were not interested.
There have been many other uncollaborated stories going around the circuit with regard to KP going to Notts, including the fact that Notts allegedly offered him more money than Warwickshire, but I still believe that the reason he was not asked back to Warwiokshire was on cricketing grounds alone and that the ultimate decision, I believe, would have been in the keeping of Bob Woolmer.
However, KP is not the first unknown cricketer to be turned by the Edgbaston hierarchy over the years, John Morris himself, was rejected by the Club and so was Dominic Cork and Glen Turner and they didn’t do too badly did they?
John Morris, you will remember scored 203 for Durham in the match in which Brian Lara scored 501 not out (John, infact, bowled the ball that BC hit for four to break Hanif Mohammad’s record).
Yours in Cricket
David Lloyd
I have heard odd tales about isolated petulant outbursts during Kevin’s time in the West Midlands. One such story is that during a Warwickshire 2′s game, he was so incensed either by maybe an umpiring decision or his own performance, that he took a wild swinging kick at the turf and ended up with a hamstring strain. This supposedly helped to seal his fate with the county, the late Bob Woolmer was a progressive coach but……..
Kevin was apparently, no fan of the area or, allegedly, the local accent, but the cricket was (and is) very strong in Birmingham and the Black Country. A number of internationals have benefited from a season in the Birmingham League, some have come back for more.
If you look at KP’s outcome with Notts, it is not just his cricket that has had to develop. Some people take longer to mature and KP was probably not right for Edgbaston in 2000. Neither might he have stayed at the county, he is after all a “big show”. This is probably what the county saw at the time.
What is certain is that the grown up and finished article is a magnificent cricketer, who wants to play for England and score runs.
By the way, I watched the last hour or so of the Lara 501, in which time he made nearly a hundred runs, with a very short boundary on one side. It was a procession along the lines of Schumacher in F1 a few years back. But there’s an old cricketing adage that runs don’t make themselves.