It’s been a while since I was able to sit down and dedicate some time to formalizing my current sporting thought, but alas, despite my many entreaties to the one above, I do not make my living watching sport.

There are advantages to that though, as it sometimes gives me more time to mull things over before committing my thoughts to words.

World cups can be very exciting, especially for those who follow a team who has a chance of winning. I wouldn’t know about that so for me there needs to be a secondary level of excitement. Indeed the recently completed World T20 was a let-down by any measure. I’ve gotten used to the disappointment, and the emotional turmoil that inevitably follows. The masochist in me even looks forward to the roller coaster ride that takes you up to the very top, then drops you just when you think you’ve made it.

The truth though is that world cups can be microcosms of life itself. And as Mick Jagger would say, If you don’t get what you want you can always re-calibrate your happiness meter to find joy on a lower level.

When I started writing this, I tried making a ‘Hierarchy of world cup pleasures’ table. For example, SA winning the tournament, trouncing Australia in the semis and England in the final would be total nirvana. On the other hand, painfully losing to either of them while they go on to win it is like, well… 1999. Still hurts.

Needless to say there are so many countless permutations to this that a definable table was not practical. But you see where I’m going. There was genuine joy at the end and Brathwaite’s magnificent 24 off the final over gave me an opportunity to let rip with a roar of genuine joy. Beggars can’t choosers; take what you’re given.

So attention turns to the next world cup, the 50-over variety, to be held in England in 2019.

And a short news headline caught my attention the other day. I had earlier heard about this listening to Darren Gough on TalkSport a few weeks ago. He was positing that Kevin Pietersen might consider making himself available to play for South Africa once his ‘stand down’ period is over. I didn’t really pay much attention to it because it seemed too absurd. But then I saw on the BBC that the devil himself was actually considering it.

For years Kevin Pietersen has made my sporting blood boil like no one else. Only Clyde Rathbone came close. In a game of word association my answer to “Kevin Pietersen” would be “Rot in hell for all eternity.”

That’s not sour grapes at a seemingly decent South African who defected to play for the enemy. There have been others before him and others will follow. I get the economic realities of the age we live in. But there are ways of doing things. There are some South Africans who went on to have decent careers with England and are still remembered quite fondly. Alan Lamb remains a very popular figure in SA. Others, like Jonathan Trott, made no noise when they left and just got on with it. Hence no one really cares about Trott one way or another.

So the point with KP is not that people hate him because he left. Half the country would too if they could. They don’t even hate him because he went on to become the leading test run scorer in England’s history. They hate him because he’s a doos. It’s that simple. (It’s hard to explain to non-South African readers what a doos is. You can google it to find your local equivalent.)

In 2005, he scored three centuries for England in the ODI series in SA. He celebrated the first, (108 n/o at Bloemfontein) by kissing the lions badge on his helmet. He did it to make a point. Total lack of class. No respect. The fact that he’s also fallen out of favour with quite literally every dressing room he’s been in, always led me to believe that the greatest service he gave SA cricket was getting on the plane for England.

Which brings me to my next point, and here I have a confession to make. I just don’t hate him as I did in the past.

Perhaps it’s because I’ve gotten older and don’t have room in my heart anymore to truly hate sportsmen who I feel have betrayed me. But that’s not the case.

I started following him on Twitter a couple of years ago. I follow many people on Twitter whom I don’t like, no doubt motivated by the same part of my psyche that has gotten used to choking in a world cup.

And to my surprise, he seems like a normal person. No tweets of him burning the SA flag, showing off his horns, or eating children for breakfast. Instead one of the first things I saw was him tweet was of him settling down to watch the Boks, Castle Lager in hand, bowl of biltong on the table.

“Aha! It’s a trick!” I said. But it wasn’t. Next he was tweeting pictures of himself visiting SA, going on game drives and hanging out with mates, legends like Graeme Smith and Jacque Kallis. If they can stand him, then maybe I need to cut him a little slack.

So I do. Just a little. This is a man after all, who in the middle of a test against South Africa, texted Smith that his own captain, Andrew Strauss, was a “doos”. Maybe he has some redeeming qualities after all.

So as absurd and as unlikely as it is, it makes for a fun intellectual exercise to imagine a scenario where he does turn out in the green and gold in 18 months’ time.

(If you are reading this and happen to be my wife, best you log off now J)

It’s the ultimate “what if” scenario. We all have that “girl who got away” when we were dating. The one we really liked. The one who seemed to be the answer to all our prayers, but left us leaving us feeling unworthy and all alone.

But what if she came back one day? Told us she never meant to hurt us after all, and that it was all a misunderstanding. The grass really wasn’t greener in England. Would we give her a chance at redemption? Would we let her bat for us?

If I try hard enough, I can see KP hitting the winning runs in the world cup final. Delirious SA fans dancing in the stands at Lords, despondent locals wondering how they let him get away. For a few fleeting moments it’s a wonderful thought. A quasi-taste of delicacies never savoured.

But life has a way of ultimately making sense of everything. There’s a reason the blonde left us all those years ago. She was psychopath who left a trail of devastation in her wake. Not unlike a certain well-meaning boy from Pietermaritzburg.

Perhaps some things are better left as dreams.