Kevin Pietersen is helping make Delhi Capitals' players better cricketers and loving it

In Capitals’ opening match, another young Indian, Ashutosh Sharma, hit 66 not out to single-handedly drag DC to a one-wicket win over Lucknow Super Giants. He celebrated by mimicking Pietersen’s trademark switch hit. “He’s a sponge,” Pietersen says of Ashutosh. “He’s a bright, bright star. Spending a lot of time with these guys, you get a lot of reward when they do well.”At a pre-season camp in Visakhapatnam, Ashutosh predicted that a team would breach 300 in a single innings during this IPL. “I was like, ‘Dude, are you serious?’ But these guys absolutely believe it… I’m watching these guys, calming them down in certain situations, and helping them practise in the right way, so that when they get to the game, they can deliver.”Across half an hour with Pietersen, his emphasis on training is a common theme: for all his flamboyance as a player, his success was underpinned by a love for the fundamentals of batting. “These guys are unbelievable workers,” he says. “Everything you see in the bright lights, don’t be fooled by it, because what they’re doing away from them is magnificent.”The coaching staff have been quite firm. I’ve been quite critical of golf… At the start of our tournament, we said that golf will only be played on off days. Every single player will be fit and at full strength for practice: you’re not going to go and spend four and a half hours in 40 degrees and come to practice lethargic. The IPL is serious business, and that stands firm.”Pietersen chats with Ashutosh Sharma, who predicted that a team may score 300 this season: “I was like, ‘Dude, are you serious?’ But these guys absolutely believe it”•Associated PressPietersen’s own embrace of the IPL caused him countless problems as a player, but he is clear about cricket’s new world order. “Anybody who thinks that India doesn’t run the game is crazy. It’s where it is. They make the decisions, they make the calls. We wouldn’t be here without Indian cricket,” he says. “Where would you be?” he asks me. “You’d be covering county cricket.”His motivations for playing in the league were regularly questioned by the ECB, but he has always cited the benefits it had on his batting. “IPL saved my career, with [advice from] Rahul Dravid,” Pietersen says of his old Royal Challengers Bengaluru team-mate. “I wasn’t playing spin the way I should have: DRS completely screwed me. Dravid helped me resurrect my game.”And so, it stands to reason that he was “bitterly disappointed” when Harry Brook pulled out of his deal with DC, earning him a two-season ban. “I told him,” Pietersen says. “I was like, ‘Dude, I’m gutted that I can’t work with you for a few months.’ I think that he is a star… You don’t hit one ball over extra cover and the next, same ball, over midwicket if you can’t play.”So he can properly play, but he has technical flaws in the subcontinent – in India, in particular. I really wanted to work with him, but people make their own choices in life and you’ve got to respect them. He has a flaw playing spin in India – a real big flaw. Two months here, imagine what might have happened if he had fixed that?”I would’ve worked the same with him as I did with [Joe] Root and [Jonny] Bairstow at the start of their careers. Root turned out to be the greatest player of spin England’s ever had. I’m not saying it’s because of what we did when he was a youngster, but we spent hours together batting in the nets, going through drills and practising. I love that stuff.”Across five seasons between 2009 and 2016, Pietersen scored 1001 runs at a strike rate of 137.42 in the IPL•Manan Vatsyayana/AFP/Getty ImagesBrook’s withdrawal prompted DC to change their plans, shuffling KL Rahul down to No. 4. Two years ago, Pietersen described watching Rahul bat in the powerplay as “the most boring thing” he had ever done while commentating: “He never lets me forget,” Pietersen says, laughing. “Every day, we have a dart at each other. I’m the villain. He’s hammering me!”But the pair have also spoken extensively about the direction of travel in the modern game, with scoring rates on the rise and the “anchor” role increasingly redundant. After lagging behind the rest of the league, Rahul has transformed his T20 game this year: his strike rate (146.06) is higher than it was in the last six IPL seasons, and his attacking intent has been evident.”One of our deepest conversations was how difficult it must be to go from a guy that starts in second, third, fourth gear, gets to fifth gear, gets to sixth gear, and then no one can stop him; to a player that now needs to start in fourth gear, end up in fifth gear very quickly, and after five or six balls, be in sixth gear for the rest of the innings,” Pietersen explains.”I just take my hat off to these players who have played a certain way for such a long time, but because of the nature of where T20 cricket is now, have mentally said to themselves, ‘I’ve got to change.’ He’s also had the actual, practical change of going to the nets and hitting his first ball for six. It’s frightening to see how good these guys are – and KL in particular.”Rahul and DC are at risk of tailing off after a bright start: they won their first four games of the season but have lost four of the last six, and have recently slipped out of the playoff spots. “We said at the start of the tournament, if we get to the playoffs with this new squad, we’ve done very well,” Pietersen says. “And then if we get to the playoffs, I think we’ve got a great chance.”Pietersen’s relationship with Grandhi could lead to further opportunities down the line. A role at Southern Brave in the Hundred is firmly on the table. “There’s a lot of conversations that I’m having: I don’t know yet,” he says. “Everything needs to fall into place.” But his first taste of coaching – or mentoring – has clearly not put him off: “I’ve absolutely loved it.”