Shane Bond Announces Retirement from All Versions of Cricket

New Zealand pacer Shane Bond has retired from all forms of cricket on Friday. The decision has come just one year after his coming back to international cricket from Indian Cricket League (ICL).

Bond retired from test cricket last December in order to prolong his injury-hit career in limited over cricket. However, now he has decided to quit playing anymore competitive cricket as his body was not giving required assistance. The pacer has also confirmed he would not play in IPL too.

Shane Bond, who turns 35 in June, represented New Zealand for 9 years since his test debut against Australia in 2001. During his short but illustrious career, he brought many successes for the Black Caps including semi final appearance in 2007 world cup in West Indies. However, New Zealand missed him for many international matches due to his recurrent injury problems.

Shane Bond played only 18 tests during his tumultuous career, but his 87 wickets at 22.09 gives the hint of his quality as a pacer.

However, Bond could show his best in 50-over format where he represented the Black Caps in 82 matches and bagged 147 wickets at an impressive average of 20.88 maintaining an economy rate of 4.28 which is enviable for a pacer today. He achieved his career-best figure 6 for 21 against Australia in 2003 world cup.

Playing 20 twenty20 internationals for New Zealand, Bond picked up 25 wickets at 21.72.

In 2007, Shane Bond decided to join rebel cricket league ICL in India and played for ICL team Delhi Giants for 2 years. As a result, New Zealand missed him for 2 years as BCCI made ICL players unavailable for selection in international cricket.

In 2009, he returned to international circuit and started playing for New Zealand again. Shane Bond also took part in IPL 2010 for Kolkata Knight Riders. He took 9 wickets at an average of 24.88 playing 8 matches for the Kolkata franchise of IPL.

In his short career, Shane Bond proved himself as a match-winning bowler for New Zealand. His speed along with agility and sheer sense of line and length made him one of the fearsome bowlers in world cricket. For some time, he was also ranked no. 1 in ICC ODI bowling ranking.

New Zealand captain Daniel Vettori said Bond’s retirement is a big loss for the team. Justin Vaughan, chief executive of New Zealand Cricket, said that Bond had left a big gap in New Zealand cricket which is ‘almost impossible to replace.’