Mike Hussey To Retire From All Cricket

Mike Hussey To Retire From All Cricket

Mike Hussey will follow Ricky Ponting into retirement after the final Test against Sri Lanka.

©REUTERS/Regi Varghese. Picture Supplied by Action Images

Australian batsman Mike Hussey has announced his surprise retirement from all forms of cricket, saying that the New Year Test against Sri Lanka at the SCG will be his last. This comes despite 2012 being one of his best year’s to date and will leave a huge hole in Australia’s middle-order ahead of the back-to-back Ashes series and this summer’s Champions Trophy.

"I've known for a while that I probably wanted to finish at the end of the Australian summer," Hussey told ESPNcricinfo. "I just wanted to see how I felt throughout the summer and my feelings hadn't really changed. I was looking ahead to the India series and the Ashes and I didn't have the same excitement or buzz about the challenges ahead. So I knew I was making the right decision because I knew my heart wasn't 100% in spending that amount of time away from home and being excited about the challenges that are going to come forward. Not very many players get to leave on their own terms, so I'm very fortunate in that respect.

"It's not so much a decision about how I'm playing, I still feel like I'm playing well. But it's more to do with everything else around the game, time away from home, the constant travel, the constant training, the constant pressures and stresses involved with international cricket as well, that eventually they take their toll on you."

Hussey has taking the unusual step of not retiring from one format or another in order to prolong his career and said that this was down to his pride at representing Australia be it in Tests, ODIs or Twenty20s.

All three formats are very challenging in their own right. I think it just comes down to pride in your own performance really. I'm very proud to be able to represent Australia, and you want to help Australia win games. That’s what the drive was, no matter what format of the game it was, and so I just wanted to approach every game, no matter what format it was, with that attitude. Wanting to win for Australia."

Hussey will leave the international game with more than 12,000 runs across the three formats and more than made up time in an international career which didn’t really begin until he was almost 30.

© Cricket World 2012