Kevin Pietersen battered Oxford ’ s students for 170 off 149 deliveries in his first game of red-ball cricket for 15 months – then insisted the incoming ECB chairman Colin Graves has told him everyone has a ‘ clean slate ’ . Pietersen ’ s quest for an improbable return to international cricket began as his scriptwriter must have known it would : with sumptuous strokes , a standing ovation and much of the old bravado . The fact that his first hundred since the Old Trafford Test against Australia in August 2013 came against a modest attack , at a windswept Oxford , in a game not deemed first-class , is beside the point . Pietersen ’ s only hope of playing for England again is to score lots of runs for Surrey – wind , rain or shine . Here was the first box ticked , in style . Surrey 's Kevin Pietersen ( right ) celebrates reaching his 100 during the three-day Match at The Parks . Pietersen makes his way out to the crease following the dismissal of Rory Burns . It was the 34-year-old 's first appearance for Surrey since the LV= County Championship in June 2013 . Asked what Graves had said to him when the pair spoke over the phone last month , Pietersen replied : ‘ He said he wants the best players playing for England , and everyone has a clean slate . Right now , it ’ s just about me hitting the red ball . I think it can help England going forward . ‘ I took confidence from the way I played in Australia [ at the Big Bash ] . It was as well as I ’ ve ever batted . I ’ ve been given a lifeline , and I have an opportunity to get back to doing something I love that was taken away from me prematurely. ’ England meet West Indies in Antigua on Monday , and comparisons will be inevitable . There will be mixed feelings both in the Caribbean and at Lord ’ s . Whether Pietersen ’ s journey will prove more futile than fruitful is another matter . The first aim of the new regime at the ECB has been to stop the sniping ; the second may be to keep Pietersen sweet in case English cricket needs him after he retires , possibly in a mentoring capacity . Regardless , the evidence here – as if it were required – suggested he is deadly serious about reclaiming his place . Pietersen has played exclusively Twenty20 cricket throughout the world since being axed by England . A young spectator points to a dent in her mother 's car made by one of Pietersen 's shots . Pietersen made 62 on his only prior appearance at The Parks , for Nottinghamshire in April 2004 . With Surrey 122 for five at lunch , Pietersen ( left ) found himself on 47 not out from 58 balls . Nearly 10 years on from his Ashes-clinching century at The Oval , Pietersen can not have imagined he would need to prosper in the Parks simply to stay afloat . But in front of a crowd of several hundred – almost unheard of in these parts – and with Surrey stumbling to 113 for five , he had a captive audience and a job to do . Pietersen was careful at first , waiting until his eighth delivery to pinch his first run in red-ball cricket since the Sydney Test of January 2014 , and not finding the boundary until his 31st . Then he opened up . His fifty came from 63 balls , his hundred from 110 , and his 150 from 137 . By the time he was out for 170 , caught at mid-on off the bowling of Abidine Sahande , a human sciences undergrad from St John ’ s College , the total was only 310 . He knocked one spectator off his stool with a fierce drive , dented a Peugeot 207 with the first of two successive straight sixes , and unveiled his full repertoire . Stealing headlines and causing damage , Pietersen might never have been away . Pietersen 's inclusion in Surrey 's line-up attracted several hundred spectators and a number of photographers .
Kevin Pietersen scored a century for Surrey against Oxford MCCU . The 34-year-old scored an impressive 170 off 149 balls . It was Pietersen 's first hundred since the Old Trafford Ashes Test in 2013 . Antigua begin their first Test with the West Indies in England on Monday .