Watson may quit Test cricket after axing
12 March, 2013
MOHALI: Shane Watson is contemplating his future in the game after being axed from the squad for the Mohali Test on disciplinary grounds and then leaving the tour to be with his pregnant wife. Watson was one of four players punished by the team management for ignoring team orders.
Since being named Michael Clarke’s vice-captain in 2011, Watson’s Twenty20 and ODI displays have remained strong but his Test appearances have been neither consistent nor convincing. His struggles in India despite being one of only two batsmen to have made a Test hundred on the subcontinent were a major contributor to Australia’s 0-2 deficit. There is little doubt Watson’s T20 career will continue for he is schedule to return to India in April for the IPL, where he had also indicated he would return to bowling for his franchise rather than his country. In ODIs he has the lure of the 2015 World Cup to sustain him. But it is now plausible that at 31 he has played his final Test match. “Any time you’re suspended for a Test match unless you do something unbelievably wrong, and obviously everyone knows what those rules are ... I think it is very harsh,” Watson told reporters at the team hotel in Chandigarh. “At this point in time I’m at a stage where I’m sort of weighing up my future and what I want to do with my cricket in general, to be honest. I do love playing, there is no doubt about that, but at this point in time I’m going to spend the next few weeks with my family and just weigh up my options of just exactly which direction I want to go.” End. |
