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The home side built a lead of 190 on a surface where run-scoring has been hard work

Andrew McGlashan19-Feb-2025Sam Konstas put away the scoops, ramps and sweeps on the second day at the SCG but could only make 17 before falling to Scott Boland for the second time in the match.The day after Konstas’ first-innings dismissal – missing a sweep against Boland from the 13th ball of the game – had ignited debate about his batting approach he was much more measured during New South Wales’ second innings in a clear response to what happened on Tuesday.Related

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Overall batting was tricky and NSW closed in a healthy position with a lead of 190 and six wickets in hand as both teams pushed for a victory that will be vital to their hopes of a place in the Sheffield Shield final.NSW head coach Greg Shipperd and batting coach Nick Larkin watched intently from the boundary edge for the duration of Konstas’ stay which ended shortly before tea when he square drove a short delivery from Boland to point.Until then, Konstas had shaped up solidly against some demanding new-ball bowling from Boland and Fergus O’Neill. He had taken until his 13th delivery to get off the mark, showing a clear intent to leave deliveries outside off, and defended largely with a straight bat although was troubled by Boland.Will Sutherland trapped Kurtis Patterson lbw•Getty Images

It wasn’t until the 11th over that he found the boundary, collecting back-to-back fours off Will Sutherland, before carving another just over point against Boland. It was an attempted repeat of that stroke which brought his downfall.”I’m all for entertainment and good batting, but that wasn’t good batting on day one. It was good fun for five minutes,” Phil Jaques, the former NSW coach, said on commentary. “It was better application from Konstas today, he was really patient and gave himself a chance to get in. It was a better innings, but unfortunately not much to show for it.”Nic Maddinson, who hit 20 off the second of the game yesterday, had fallen early to a pearler from O’Neill while Kurtis Patterson was pinned lbw by Sutherland having worked hard for 28.Matthew Gilkes and Josh Philippe, the latter who was struck a nasty blow on the helmet, added 55 to turn the game more firmly NSW’s way until Philippe fell late in the day to Boland. His innings had included a bizarre moment shortly before his dismissal when it appeared umpire Simon Lightbody was giving him lbw to Mitch Perry only to stop raising his finger part way through leaving Victoria perplexed.Victoria had resumed on 92 for 4 and were quickly in deep trouble when Jackson Bird had Marcus Harris caught at point second ball of the day then trapped Sam Harper lbw before the opening over was done. It left Bird on 399 Sheffield Shield wickets, one short of becoming the fifth bowler to reach 400.When Sutherland fell to Hanno Jacobs, Victoria were still more than 100 adrift but nightwatchman Perry, who was given a life at cover by Gilkes, and No. 9 O’Neill eked out 34 in 16 overs until O’Neill was well held at long leg by Jacobs when he top-edged what became the last ball before lunch.NSW were frustrated for nine overs by the last-wicket pair with Boland making a handy contribution before Perry was last out, driving to mid-off, have faced 122 balls for 29.

Bangladesh made three other changes to the side that played Sri Lanka while India went in unchanged

ESPNcricinfo staff24-Sep-2025Toss Jaker Ali, Bangladesh’s 12th T20I captain, won his first toss and chose to bowl in the Asia Cup Super Fours match against India in Dubai. Jaker stepped into the role – and also took over the wicketkeeping gloves – with Litton Das ruled out with a side strain.With Litton out, Parvez Hossain Emon came back into the side and is expected to open alongside Tanzid Hasan, with Saif Hasan moving down to No. 3. Bangladesh made three other changes from the XI that beat Sri Lanka on Saturday, all to their bowling attack. Out went the offspinner Mahedi Hasan and seamers Taskin Ahmed and Shoriful Islam, and in came legspinner Rishad Hossain, fast bowler Tanzim Hasan Sakib, and the seam-bowling allrounder Mohammad Saifuddin, who plays his first match of the tournament.India were unchanged as expected.India: 1 Abhishek Sharma, 2 Shubman Gill, 3 Suryakumar Yadav (capt), 4 Tilak Varma, 5 Sanju Samson (wk), 6 Shivam Dube, 7 Hardik Pandya, 8 Axar Patel, 9 Kuldeep Yadav, 10 Varun Chakravarthy, 11 Jasprit BumrahBangladesh: 1 Tanzid Hasan, 2 Parvez Hossain Emon, 3 Saif Hasan, 4 Towhid Hridoy, 5 Jaker Ali (capt & wk), 6 Shamim Hossain, 7 Mohammad Saifuddin, 8 Rishad Hossain, 9 Nasum Ahmed, 10 Mustafizur Rahman, 11 Tanzim Hasan Sakib

The left-handed opener compiled an impressively composed innings to leave his team in a strong position

AAP26-Nov-2024Campbell Kellaway scored his maiden Sheffield Shield century to put Victoria in the box seat of their pink-ball clash with Queensland at the Gabba.Queensland went to stumps on day three struggling at 58 for 3 chasing 329 for victory.  Kellaway made a seven-ball duck in Victoria’s sub-par first-innings total of 186. But the 22-year-old was in a class of his own in Victoria’s second innings, combining with Marcus Harris for a 154-run opening stand to catapult the visitors back into the contest.Related

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Tom Rogers, Matt Short and Peter Handscomb also chipped in with handy knocks to help lift Victoria to an imposing 439.In reply, Queensland lost Matt Renshaw for a duck to 40-year-old veteran Peter Siddle in the first over of their run chase and they were 32 for 2 when Bryce Street fell for 7.Angus Lovell put up some resistance, but he was sent packing following a stunning one-handed catch by Short while he was running with the flight of the ball from slip to haul in a top-edged pull.Victoria started day three at 122 without loss in their second innings Harris was caught at slip off the bowling of Lovell, but Kellaway went on with the job to post his maiden Shield century.Kellaway’s 175-ball knock, which featured 14 boundaries, was finally brought to an end when he was bowled by Street in the final over before the dinner break.Queensland used eight bowlers in their bid to make inroads into Victoria’s strong batting line-up, but breakthroughs were few and far between

Bangladesh’s chances of making the semis took a big hit after they faltered with both bat and ball

Srinidhi Ramanujam10-Oct-2024Karishma Ramharack’s four-wicket haul and Hayley Matthews’ quickfire 34 helped West Indies coast to an important eight-wicket victory against Bangladesh, in Sharjah. Having chased down the target of 104 in 12.5 overs, West Indies, with their second win in three matches, moved to top of Group B. Three teams from this group are now in contention for the two semi-final spots with South Africa and England also on four points, but the latter have played only two matches.Bangladesh succumbed to their second straight defeat in three matches and their chances of advancing to the knockouts took a big hit. Batting once again hurt Bangladesh as they lost six wickets for 27 runs after they were sent in to bat.

Ramharack rips through Bangladesh

West Indies used as many as seven bowlers but it was Ramharack who stood out by taking a wicket each in her four overs across different phases of the game. The offspinner struck with her very first delivery when opener Shathi Rani tried to sweep and missed. Shemaine Campbelle took the bails off in a flash to effect a stumping. In her second over, the last one in the powerplay, Dilara Akter moved across to sweep but missed, only to expose her middle stump and be bowled. When Ramharack came out to bowl in the 13th over, she mixed her lines well but kept the ball outside off. She had Sobhana Mostary stumped by making her come down the track to an outside offstump delivery. That ended the 40-run third-wicket stand for Bangladesh.Stafanie Taylor and Hayley Matthews added 52 for the opening wicket•ICC/Getty Images

Just when Nigar Sultana and Ritu Moni were looking to stitch a stand during the death overs, Ramaharack came back and knocked Moni out. Chinelle Henry took an excellent running catch after the batter came down and miscued a lofted shot to deep midwicket. Ramharack finished with 4 for 17.

Sultana’s slowdown

Bangladesh showed positive intent with the bat early on, with the openers charging down as early as the second over to go aerial. Nigar started briskly after the openers fell in the powerplay. She particularly took legspinner Afy Fletcher on and smacked three fours off her second over and moved to 20 off 17 balls. However, once Mostary fell in the 13th over and Fletcher struck twice in the 15th, Nigar, who was on 27 off 27, slowed down despite West Indies’ sloppy fielding. Her next 17 deliveries fetched just 12 runs and eventually, she fell to Matthews in the final over attempting a big heave towards deep midwicket.

Matthews steers WI’s chase

Bangladesh struggled to pitch the ball up and got punished as they erred on the shorter side. It allowed the West Indies batters to rock back and play their shots. Matthews, in particular, pounced on this opportunity in the powerplay and blunted the Bangladesh attack. After being on a run-a-ball seven, Matthews lined up the left-arm spin of Nahida Akter with a punch off the backfoot, piercing the gap between cover and extra cover. Two balls later, Nahida bowled short again and received the same treatment.Legspinner Fahima Khatun, after having given away just four runs off her first over, bowled short on off stump in the fifth over and Matthews stayed back and punched uppishly to find her third boundary on the off side. Marufa Akter overpitched the last ball of the powerplay, which Matthews drove through cover to bring up her sixth boundary. But she was bowled by a nip-backer from the fast bowler in the eighth over for a 22-ball 34. At the end of Marufa’s over though, West Indies needed just 49 off 72 balls which was taken care of by Stafanie Taylor – before she limped off retired hurt – and Deandra Dottin, who smashed an unbeaten 19 off just seven balls.

Matthews’ knock wasn’t enough as West Indies were eventually bowled out for 238 in big chase

Shashank Kishore24-Dec-2024The game witnessed two majestic hundreds, from Harleen Deol and Hayley Matthews. Where Deol had support of three other half-centurions in the Indian innings, Matthews had none. And that in a monumental chase of 359 was simply not good enough.The end result was another one-sided fare that gave India the ODI series with one match remaining, but it was also one where West Indies showed a lot more fight than they did two nights ago. They nearly batted out the 50 overs to take away something from a contest they never looked like bossing at any point.West Indies’ response to India’s 358 for 5 – their joint-highest ODI total – was circumspect. They batted out three maidens in the first seven overs, two of those to Renuka Singh, who had wrecked their top order with in-swing to finish with a five-for in the first ODI. It underlined West Indies’ approach for large parts of their innings – survival over flamboyance that they’re known for.As the innings progressed, it became evident how big the gulf was between Matthews and the rest of their batters, who hardly seemed to trust their defense and bat long enough against an Indian attack that boasted of some variety that will give them a welcome headache as they go forward in a World Cup year. Only Deandra Dottin can claim to have received a pearler that she had no answers to as Renuka ripped past her inside edge to flatten the stumps with a superb in-ducker.Mathews aside, the only other semblance of a fight from the West Indies came from wicketkeeper Shemaine Campbelle, who made 38 in a fifth-wicket stand that was worth 112. Matthews was brutal in her onslaught against India’s spinners, especially legspinner Priya Mishra whom she read from the hand and off the pitch. Against pace, she was quick to pounce on anything short or wide. Yet, it wasn’t until she had crossed 70 that she began to show off her full range of strokes, eventually getting to her seventh ODI hundred off 99 balls. But Matthews’ century only served to merely reduce the margin of defeat.Hayley Matthews celebrates her third ODI ton from her last six innings•BCCI

The story of the day, though, was Deol. Having been on crutches, recovering from a knee injury until five months ago, she repaid the faith the team management had in her by hitting a maiden international hundred from No.3. Dropped on 20 by Dottin at square leg, Deol made them pay. She built slowly to a half-century, reaching there in 62 balls, but shifted gears seamlessly in the end overs to raise her century off 98 balls.In Jemimah Rodrigues,
she found an able ally as the pair put on a quick-fire 116-run stand off just 71 deliveries for the fourth wicket in a partnership where they attempted a shot every ball. Rodrigues was outstanding against spin, lofting inside-out over cover, paddling fired-in deliveries past short fine leg, or rocking back to pull. Along the way, she showed her versatility to accelerate as comfortably as she had built the innings. The reward was a half-century off 34 deliveries, before she was out attempting to hit out a waist-high full toss.Deol fed off that energy, in addition to the confidence from spending time at the crease. In all, India scored 184 in the last 20 overs, compared to the 160 they hit two nights ago. That they achieved this with Richa Ghosh contributing just an unbeaten 13 should give them much encouragement.Deol’s knock was preceded by a second straight century opening stand from Smriti Mandhana and rookie Pratika Rawal, who looked anything like the nervous version from her debut on Sunday. She came out looking to score quickly. There wasn’t much swing on offer, and Rawal impressed with her intent and strokeplay to set the base of India’s innings after they elected to bat.At the other end, Mandhana, who became the highest run-getter in women’s ODI this year, simply carried on from where she left off in the series opener. She displayed more than just traces of brute force in muscling spinners. Rawal was comfortably outscoring Mandhana until the eighth over, but it didn’t take long for the India vice-captain to catch up, before overtaking her to raise a 29th half-century and her second straight of the series off just 44 balls. One ball later, the opening pair raised their century stand.Rawal soon caught up to get to her maiden half-century but missed out on a great chance of converting it to a maiden international hundred, when she was out to a soft dismissal on 76. But in taking two wickets and sending down a few tight overs, and taking an excellent catch inside the ring, Rawal had a day neither she nor the team management will forget in a hurry, not even after having had a role in running out Mandhana, who instead of fuming gave her a pat of encouragement as she walked back.

The duo added an unconquered 143 after joining forces at 70 for 2, and have left South Africa needing only 69 more on the fourth day

Andrew McGlashan13-Jun-20252:23

Day 3 review: Markram’s knock could be career-defining

South Africa can dare to dream. With Aiden Markram and Temba Bavuma playing the most significant innings of their careers, the latter while carrying a hamstring injury, they closed within 69 runs of claiming the World Test Championship title, which would be the finest hour for a cricket nation steeped in history but short on silverware.The second-wicket pair combined to add 143 in 38 overs of wonderfully controlled batting, a partnership that will go down in South Africa folklore barring extraordinary events on the fourth morning, with Markram reaching his eighth Test century from 156 deliveries in the closing moments of the day. They repelled everything Australia threw at them on a pitch that, with the sun out for most of the day, was at its friendliest for batting in the Test. The way Australia’s last-wicket pair of Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood had earlier been able to add 59 in 22 overs had foretold what was to come.Related

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Still, Australia felt favourites when they set about defending 282. Despite the early loss of Ryan Rickelton, edging a very full delivery from Starc which was confirmed by the third umpire, there was a notable urgency to South Africa’s batting. In the first innings, it took until the 20th over to reach 30 (three wickets were gone by then), whereas this time they were 47 for 1 after ten.Starc struck again to have Wiaan Mulder caught low at cover, but then came a vital moment when Bavuma, on 2, edged to Steven Smith at first slip. Smith was stood so close – he was wearing a helmet as the carry off the surface continued to die – and the chance burst through his hands, leaving him with a compound dislocation of his right little finger. The agony was clear on his face as he immediately left the field. By the end of the day, it was likely shared by his team-mates.Shortly before tea, Bavuma joined the injury list when he picked up a hamstring injury but he defied the pain, mixing hobbling between the wickets with some crisp strokeplay. It was going to take much more than a tweaked muscle to stop Bavuma. There was, however, a question to be asked as to whether Australia could have squeezed an injured batter hard in the field. The closest Bavuma came to a mistake was when he top-edged Nathan Lyon towards deep square-leg on 43 but Sam Konstas, on as a substitute, couldn’t quite make enough ground with a full-length dive that left him with a mouthful of grass.Aiden Markram brought up his eighth Test century•ICC/Getty Images

Meanwhile, Markram was all but faultless. He kept the scoreboard ticking – Australia sent down just three maidens in 56 overs – alongside a selection of handsome boundaries, none better than the back-cut off Starc which bisected deep third and deep point with precision and left the bowler waving his arms in frustration. He would then move to 97 with the sweetest of straight drives against Hazlewood. As the close neared, and it appeared he may have to wait for the morning, his crowning moment arrived with a whip through the leg side.Pat Cummins went through all the options at his disposal, but nothing could conjure the moment to create an opening. Lyon caused some problems out of the rough and came very close on a few occasions while Travis Head’s first delivery ragged sharply at Markram. They will need a miracle on Saturday.It was South Africa’s surge with the ball on the second day that had kept them in the game after conceding a lead of 74, but Alex Carey had pushed the advantage over 200. When Lyon was lbw to Kagiso Rabada in the third over of the day – his ninth wicket of the match – it appeared Australia’s innings would end swiftly, but the last-wicket pair had other ideas.3:26

Hayden: Starc showed courage with the bat

It was not the first time Starc and Hazlewood had combined in such a fashion, surviving 18 overs together against India in Perth last year, while Hazlewood has also previously shown his stickability when helping Cameron Green add 116 against New Zealand in Wellington earlier in 2024.There was rarely anything expansive about the partnership but for large stages the duo were untroubled which was a hint at the changing batting conditions. Starc shielded Hazlewood on occasions, particularly against Rabada and Marco Jansen, but Hazlewood produced one of shots of partnership when he ramped Jansen over the slips.Starc has always had batting pedigree and at times has underdelivered for his talent in Test cricket. This half-century, coming off 131 balls, was his first since Old Trafford in 2019 and it ended as the second-most deliveries he had faced behind the career-best 99 (a Test high score he shares with wife Alyssa Healy).At times South Africa seemed strangely flat but so, too, did the pitch for the first time in the game. In the end it was the sixth bowler used in the session, Markram, who ended the resistance when Hazlewood drove off the back foot to cover. And so the final question was posed: was 282 chaseable? The answer, historically so for South Africa, would appear to be in the affirmative.

Rawal made contact with Filer and Ecclestone in two separate incidents during India’s successful chase against England

ESPNcricinfo staff18-Jul-2025India opening batter Pratika Rawal has been fined 10% of her match fee and handed one demerit point for “avoidable physical contact” during the first ODI against England on Tuesday, which India won by four wickets.Two separate incidents took place during India’s chase, which came in for scrutiny by the match officials.The first was when Rawal played a ball off Lauren Filer in the 18th over and went across for a single. While approaching the non-striker’s end, she made contact with the bowler. Then, in the next over, after being bowled by Sophie Ecclestone for a 51-ball 36, Rawal made contact with Ecclestone on her way back to the dressing room.Related

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Rawal pleaded guilty to the Level 1 breach of the ICC’s code of conduct, which relates to “inappropriate and deliberate physical contact between players in the course of play”.”It [the collision with Filer] was not intentional; I was just running in my way,” Rawal said ahead of the second ODI at Lord’s*. “And the shoulder barge thing was also not deliberate. I don’t think there is [need to have] any reaction to it or [make] any fuss about it.”While she was in the middle, Rawal stitched together partnerships of 48 with Smriti Mandhana for the first wicket and 46 with Harleen Deol for the second wicket, setting up the chase of 259, which India completed comfortably thanks to a 90-run stand between Jemimah Rodrigues (48) and Deepti Sharma (62*) for the fifth wicket.England, meanwhile, were fined 5% of their match fee for maintaining a slow over-rate. They were found to be one over short of the target in the time allotted for completing their overs, though they didn’t have to bowl all 50, India getting over the line with ten balls in hand.England and India will meet each other for the second ODI on Saturday, at Lord’s, before the last game of the tour, the third ODI in Chester-le-Street on Tuesday. India had earlier won the T20I series 3-2.* 1300 GMT Updated with Rawal’s qoute

Kumar Sangakkara has called on his spinners to raise their game in the final Test in Mumbai

Sa'adi Thawfeeq27-Nov-2009It hasn’t been a great tour for Muttiah Muralitharan so far•AFP

Sri Lanka came into the series intending to secure their maiden Test victory on Indian soil but were left with a lot of soul searching to do after they were thrashed by an innings-and-144-runs in the second Test in Kanpur.Though India ran up 642, Sri Lanka captain Kumar Sangakkara defended the selection of three spinners. “If we had won the toss and batted first on the wicket and got a decent amount of runs on the board our spinners would have been quite a threat on this track,” he said. “It would have been very hard to score runs off them as well. The chances that we did create were not taken by us, allowing the Indian batsmen to get away on a really flat track. 400 runs on the first day was a little too much.”The main concern for Sri Lanka was the inability of the world’s leading wicket-taker Muttiah Muralitharan to provide the breakthroughs for his team as he had done till the recent past. Murali went for over hundred runs for the second time in two Tests; so far in the series his returns are five wickets for 396 runs, average 79.20. “It does become a concern when your star strike bowler is not really picking up the wickets you know he can, but he is still the best bowler that’s played the game,” Sangakkara said. “You still have to have faith in him and trust him and back him 100% to do the job because he is going to do it at one point, hopefully in the next Test.”The Kanpur defeat was the largest in terms of runs to India but Sangakkara remained optimistic that he had the bowlers to win in Mumbai. “We have the potential to pick 20 wickets with the bowlers that we have,” he said. “Potential is one thing really doing the job is another. We would like a bit more penetration with the spin.”With our fast bowlers we always created opportunities, the disappointing thing is we haven’t really taken those chances twice in the first over in two Test matches, especially this one on a track that was one of the flattest we’ve played on.”We’ve still got a lot to achieve in Mumbai. We can still equal the series and finish one-all. That’s a great motivation for us. Disappointed with today’s defeat, but that’s the way cricket goes. If you don’t play well enough you lose and you’ve got to accept that responsibility but still move on. You have no one else to blame. You got to look at the 16 players in the dressing room and say that we were just not good enough. We were outplayed by India who were a better team in this Test match.”It was a good toss to win for Dhoni the first day the wicket was going to be the flattest and it got slower and slower as the game progressed. If we probably had kept India down to about 450 in the first innings it would have been a chance for us to come back, but 600 runs on we were always chasing. Bad batting in our first innings put us into trouble.”

The 26-year-old Afghanistan spinner went past Dwayne Bravo’s tally of 631

ESPNcricinfo staff04-Feb-2025Rashid Khan, for long one of the most compelling sights in T20 cricket, has now climbed to a pinnacle becoming the format’s highest wicket-taker ever. The 26-year-old Afghanistan wristspinner went past Dwayne Bravo’s tally of 631 wickets when he bowled Dunith Wellalage in the SA20 qualifier 1 against Paarl Royals on Tuesday.”It’s a great achievement,” Rashid told the host broadcaster after his team secured victory. “I never thought about it, if you asked 10 years before this if I would get there. It’s a proud feeling to be from Afghanistan and to be at that level where you top the table. DJ [Bravo] is one of the best T20 bowlers. It’s a great honour and I’m looking forward to continuing.”Related

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Rashid made his T20 debut when he was still a teenager in October 2015. He is now fast approaching 500 matches having been a hugely sought after player in leagues all over the world. He has won an IPL title and a PSL title and was virtually a household name in Adelaide where he played 69 matches for the Strikers, including picking up career-best figures of 6 for 17.The ability to bowl quickly through the air and keep the stumps in play made Rashid an extremely difficult bowler to face, especially since it was hard to pick which way the ball was going to turn. He gave batters no time to adjust and very little clues what was going to happen. Eventually, teams simply started playing him out without taking too much risk. Rashid could run through a side – he has 20 hauls of four wickets or more – but his defining quality was that he could always keep opposition batters under control.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

Rashid spoke about how wickets weren’t necessarily his priority in an interview with The Cricket Monthly last year. “If someone is going after me, I’m going to make it super hard for him. If he still hits it, it’s a good shot. But I won’t ease down [on creating the pressure]. It’s more about making things harder and harder for the batter.”As he gained experience – Rashid has played in the Hundred, CPL and the BPL – his batting also improved. He is known for his ability to come in and hit sixes straight away and has a shot all his own, called the snake shot, where he gets underneath a yorker length ball and whirls his wrists to such an extent the bat makes contact and surges back, like whiplash. Rashid’s all-round prowess was on show in the playoffs of IPL 2018 when he made 34 off just 10 balls to lift Sunrisers Hyderabad to a total of 170 and then helped defend it by taking 3 for 19 and taking two catches as well.In a sign of how influential Rashid can be, his current IPL team, Gujarat Titans, retained his services for INR 15 crore (USD 1.8 million approx).

Veteran allrounder set to move into coaching after calling time on 19-year professional career

ESPNcricinfo staff25-Sep-2024Steven Croft, Lancashire’s veteran allrounder and stalwart of their 2011 Championship-winning side, has announced his retirement from professional cricket at the age of 39.Croft stepped down from first-class and List A cricket at the end of the 2023 summer, and had been on a T20-only deal for this summer’s campaign. However, he has now confirmed his full retirement with immediate effect, and will instead move into Lancashire’s coaching staff on a full-time basis.His final appearance came earlier this month, in Lancashire’s defeat to Sussex in the Vitality Blast quarter-final, and was his 600th match for the club across formats. He made his Lancashire debut in 2005, and went on to make a total of 19,183 runs, as well as claim 199 wickets with his offspin.In 2011, he scored the winning runs against Somerset at Taunton, as Lancashire ended a 77-year wait for the County Championship, and four years later, he captained the T20 team to their maiden T20 Blast title at Edgbaston, beating Northamptonshire in the final.Between June 2006 and July 2018, Croft played 148 consecutive T20 matches for Lancashire, which is an English record. He finishes his career as Lancashire’s leading T20 run-scorer with 5,486 runs.”My dream as a boy was to play one game for Lancashire, in the end it became 600,” Croft said. “So, after just over two decades of playing for the club, I have taken the decision to retire as a player.”I can confidently say I have realised my dream and more, and what a ride it has been. To go with the games, runs, wickets and catches, I have played alongside some of my heroes and many greats of the game.”There have been so many highlights along the way, too. Winning the County Championship in 2011 will stay with me forever. The 2015 T20 Blast too, what a great night that was! But also, being awarded my county cap and being appointed club captain were special moments.Mark Chilton, Lancashire’s Director of Cricket, added: “On behalf of everyone at the club, I would like to congratulate Steven on an incredible Lancashire career.”Steven epitomises everything good about this club. He is an outstanding individual who always puts the team first and anyone who has watched him knows that Steven puts his heart and soul into every game and his record speaks for itself.”To be such an influential member of our side – as well as contributing to so many match-winning performances – over such a long period of time is something he should be very proud of.”Players like Steven don’t come around too often and whilst we will miss his skill and experience on the field, we’re thrilled that he will continue to play a vital role in continuing to develop the exciting young players we have at Emirates Old Trafford, working across the Men’s First Team, Second XI and Academy.”Even over the last 12 months, I’ve been really impressed with how quickly he’s taken to coaching and the impact he’s had in a short period of time. I am looking forward to seeing him develop these skills in the next chapter of his career.”