“Cook is the only one who can target Sachin’s record whereas Root is the next superstar,” says Kevin Pietersen. He praised the England skipper, Alastair Cook, for his remarkable job as a captain which has revived the national team in the Test format. He also applauded him for his fine batting which led them to the victory in test series against India.
KP was quoted by Indian Express saying, "For me he's the right man to lead England, he's doing a great job for us and he will continue to get better and better and break every record anyone's ever set, certainly in the English game. He's on target to go for Tendulkar's numbers, if you look at the numbers and look at his age."
28-year-old Cook is over 8000 runs behind the batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar in the overall standings of highest run-getters. "His first series was against India away and we beat India. He's done exceptionally well, his cricket just keeps getting better and better," he added.
Right-handed batsman showered his praises on the young talented batsman Joe Root who has been highly impressive since his debut against India last year. Pietersen was quoted by The Hindu saying, "I never knew of him, I never heard of him, because when you're on the scene and young players come you just don't. But I knew that he was going to be good when he walked out to bat in Nagpur in his first Test match. I was batting and... we just didn't want to let India back into it at all and he walked out and - just his face walking towards me for 20 metres - I thought this kid's going to be a flipping superstar.”
"It was just the confidence that he walked out to bat with in his debut Test match in India, two spinners bowling, from each end, we'd just lost a wicket or a couple of wickets and he walked out with a smile on his face, and went 'All right lad, you ok, you're playing well there'," he added.
Pietersen gave a much expected answer when he was asked about his love and hate relationship with media. He was quoted by Hindustan Times saying, "I've been burnt too many times and it's just a case of me now concentrating on my cricket and playing my cricket as best I can because that whole situation hurt my family too much. I get it all day every day."
"Somebody asked me yesterday, 'Can you take some constructive criticism?' I said, 'Excuse me? You're talking to somebody who has it for breakfast, lunch and dinner.' So it doesn't affect me, it's water off a duck's back now. I have absolutely no interest in it but it hurt my family and my best mates," he concluded.