Kevin Pietersen Cricket Academy will launch in October this year with both kids and adult cricketers in the UAE set to benefit from the former England international’s Dubai setup.
Childrens’ categories start at under 7s and run right up to young adults.
Meanwhile, Dubai cricket clubs can look forward to welcoming high-quality club cricketers and Minor Counties players who will come to the region to both coach and play the sport.
Pietersen, who recently took time out from a trip to Dubai to play cricket with kids in the street, will visit the programme in between his commitments as a freelance cricketer.
Following his highly publicised departure from the England fold earlier this year, Pietersen will be heading from London to Australia, India and the Caribbean to play T20 cricket for a variety of franchises, making Dubai’s location perfect for his globetrotting.
While England fans still rue the ECB’s decision to cast Pietersen into the wilderness, international cricket’s loss is the KPCA’s gain.
“He’ll be very hands on,” explained Pietersen’s good friend, former Nottinghamshire and Hampshire team-mate and Academy Director, Richard Logan.
“He’s going to come over at least four times a year and spend three or four days with the academy. People understand that he has other commitments with all his IPL stuff and his other interests, but he’s fully committed to it and he wants to spend as much time as possible over here.
“He’s going to try and get some of his other international friends to come and help out as well and we’re going to do a number of Skype meetings and Q&A sessions throughout. I’ve just come from the UK where I’ve been finalising coaching programmes with him and he has been very hands on with those as well.”
Logan will lead the coaching programmes in Dubai alongside an as yet unnamed Head Coach and a number of support staff from the UK interested in developing their playing and coaching careers.
“We’re going to have a team of coaches come over from the UK on a development programme that will bulk up the team during the first year while we find and recruit some local coaches of a good enough quality.
“There will be at least six coaches who we will hopefully place in local clubs as well. We’re also going to try and set up some games with teams in the local area. We want to improve UAE cricket through the academy.”
The Dubai academy is the first of its kind but Pietersen and his team are already in the process of expansion.
On announcement of the venture, Pietersen said that India would also benefit from the affiliation and England’s highest run scorer was joined by Logan and the rest of the team in Qatar last week to discuss making it the second Gulf country to house the project.
“We’re in talks with two or three people in India and we’ve had talks with Qatar,” added Logan.
“[Qatar] is at its early stages but both them and us are keen and there is an untapped market out there.
“Qatar approached us and said they wanted to do something at the national stadium. We got to meet everyone involved and there is definitely scope to do something out there.”
Watch Pietersen's spontaneous game of street cricket, here.
