Indian women’s cricket great and ODI captain Mithali Raj announced her retirement from T20 Internationals today.
The 36-year-old said she wants to focus on her ODI career, keeping in mind the 2021 World Cup in New Zealand.
The veteran cricketer’s announcement came as a surprise, considering that she had last week made herself available for the home series against South Africa, beginning from 24th of this month.
Mithali ended her T20 career with 2,364 runs from 89 matches at an average of 37.5 and the highest score of 97 not out. She made her T20 International debut in 1999 and played her last match in March against England in Guwahati.
Mithali is also the first Indian woman to reach the landmark of 2000 T20 runs.
The senior opener captained the country in 32 T20 Internationals, including the three World Cups in 2012 (Sri Lanka), 2014 (Bangladesh) and 2016 (India).
In 203 ODIs, she scored 6,720 runs at an average of 51.29, with seven hundreds. She has also played in 10 Tests, with 663 runs including a hundred.