Retirement is something that each and every person has to face in his/her life time. So a cricketer also has to retire one day, doesn’t matter how much he wants to play the game because of the love towards the sport.
Generally, cricketers decide to retire if they feel that they are not contributing enough to the team like they used to do or else when they realize that they have contributed enough to the team’s success and completed the responsibility and it’s time to hand over the responsibility to the upcoming talented young heirs of future cricket.
Retirements are unfortunate but there are times when cricketers made a comeback after their retirement.
Here are the 5 renowned cricketers who made a comeback after retirement:
– by Rishita Patnaik
1.SHAHID AFRIDI:
Shahid Afridi, the man who is famous for his impeccable all-around skills, is a legendary player of the Pakistan Cricket Team. Apart from being a successful cricketer, according to Imran Khan, it has probably been a joke for Afridi to make comebacks to the International cricket after announcing his retirements. All of this first started in 2006, in which he announced his retirement from tests but made a comeback in 2010 and that too as a captain for his side. He leads his side for just a single match and he quit. It was a similar scenario in case of
It was a similar scenario in case of one-day cricket format too. He announced his retirement from ODI cricket right after 2011 world cup and Misbah -ul-Haq was named as the captain but again towards the end of 2011 he made a comeback in the ODI side and played till the 2015 world cup. The thought of retiring from t20I format of the cricket was clouding arounding him and at the same time he made it clear to everyone that he will play the 2016 world cup and then decide about the retirement. But yet again he joined his team after that world cup too. Recently Afridi has announced his retirement from T20 form of international cricket in February 2017 and has promised to play domestic cricket for two more years.
2. CARL HOOPER:
Carl Hooper, the West Indian legendary player, holds a record of being the first cricketer in the world to have scored 5000 runs and to take 100 wickets. The Caribbean player suddenly announced his retirement just three weeks before the 1999 world cup but later he made a comeback in 2001 to the international side. He was named as the captain of his side and he leads his team in 2003 world cup tournament in which the West Indies team couldn’t make it to the second round of the tournament due to some abysmal performances by the team players. Even then he was named in the squad for the next match but he pulled himself back and retired from international cricket because he wanted a young player to play for the team in his place.
3. KEVIN PIETERSEN:
Kevin Pietersen, applauded as the ‘England’s greatest modern batsman’ , announced his retirement from the shorter formats of the game in May 2011. But later he made a comeback within few months after his retirement. Kevin’s career was a bit controversial as he had some issues with the ECB and coach Peter Moores. He withdrew his retirement during the South African series and conveyed to the board that he is devoted to play all forms of cricket for his side. But his selection in team was not considered as the differences between the ECB and him still existed and eventually it hampered his career growth.
4. IMRAN KHAN:
Imran Khan, the all time best captain for the Pakistan Cricket Team, announced his retirement post-1987 world cup. But later on the President of Pakistan Mr. Zia Ul Haq insisted him to come back to the international side and due to a popular demand he made a comeback to the international team in 1992 and proved to everyone that the comeback decision was right as he lead his team to the world cup victory in 1992 in style.
5. GRANT FLOWER:
In 2004, Zimbabwe Cricket Board sacked Heath Streak from Zimbabwe’s captaincy position just because of him being a white player. This did not go well with many cricketers and thus all of them united and threatened the board that if the board will not over turn their decision then the cricketers will quit. As the board did not listen to them, some of the cricketers unit including Grant Flower announced their retirement. Six years later, Grant made a surprising comeback and later because of his poor form, he pulled himself out from the team and announced his final retirement in 2010.
– by Rishita Patnaik