'You’ve really tweeted this?' - Kevin Pietersen, Alviro Peterson involve in war of words on Twitter

Former England captain Kevin Pietersen found himself at odds with former South Africa opener Alviro Peterson over the conviction of his compatriot cricketer Gulam Bodi on charges of fixing matches in a domestic T20 tournament in South Africa in 2015. Bodi, 40, who played two ODIs and one T20I in 2007, is the first person to have been sentenced (for five years) under the Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act of 2004 that came into effect after the Hansie Cronje match-fixing scandal that had rocked the cricketing world in 2000.

Alviro, who played his last international for SA in 2015, took to Twitter to express his satisfaction over Bodi’s conviction and called it a “great day for cricket”. “Good day for cricket!!! Gulam Bodi just been sentenced to 5 years in prison. He will apply for leave to Appeal and to extend bail his bail, pending the outcome of the appeal,” the 38-year-old wrote in his post.

Kevin Pietersen accuses Peterson and gets counter accused

Pietersen, who is also a South African-born, was not happy with Peterson’s tweet. However, Petersen’s post didn’t go down well with Kevin Pietersen and the latter quickly reminded the former of his part in the match-fixing scandal. The reason being Peterson was also among the six other players apart from Bodi who had faced the fixing charges and have already served bans ranging between two to 12 years. Those six are Peterson, Thami Tsolekile, Jean Symnes, Ethy Mbhalati, Lonwabo Tsotsobe and Pumi Matshikwe.

In his tweet, Pietersen replied to Peterson saying: “You’ve really tweeted this when YOU were banned for two years for the part YOU played?!?! Wow!”

The former South Africa national did not remain silent after hearing Pietersen mocking him and raised another issue from the ex-England player’s past. In his counter tweet, Peterson said, “What’s wrong with it? You seem to know a lot, why was I banned for 2 years? While you are busy explaining, explain; 1. Reporting your captain to us in 2012, mid series? 2. Newlands test? That’s it, FOR NOW…!!”

Peterson’s tweet targeting Pietersen was in reference to an incident of the summer of 2012. The 39-year-old was suspended for the third Test against South Africa at Lord’s after it had emerged that he had been sending messages on Blackberry messenger to members in the opponent team. Pietersen had admitted to sending the text messages to the South African side but also accused the then captain Andrew Strauss of “milking” the furore that followed later.