On this day in 2018: Kevin Pietersen announces retirement from cricket

A “super proud” Kevin Pietersen confirmed his cricket career was finally over on this day four years ago.

The former England captain had been playing for the Quetta Gladiators in the Pakistan Super League, helping them qualify from the group stages and move closer to a third successive final appearance in the T20 tournament.

“Thank you for all the quite lovely msgs! I loved entertaining you all! Ciao, cricket! I love this game!” the prolific batsman, then 37, wrote on Instagram.

The South African-born batsman had effectively been retired from cricket’s biggest stage since his England exile began in 2014, a high-profile casualty of the 2013/14 Ashes whitewash defeat.

He embarked on a nomadic T20 career after that, taking in all corners of the globe, with Quetta Gladiators the last stop on an extended farewell tour.

Pietersen played in 104 Test matches for England, scoring 8,181 runs at an average of 47.28 with 23 hundreds. In 136 One-Day Internationals he scored 4,440 runs at an average of 40.73, while he also finished with 1,176 runs from 37 T20Is.

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