Former KKR player announces retirement from white-ball cricket

Saurashtra’s Sheldon Jackson, who has also been part of Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) and Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s (RCB) squads in the Indian Premier League (IPL), has announced his retirement from white-ball cricket. 

The 38-year-old made the announcement during the ongoing 2024-24 Vijay Hazare Trophy. The right-handed batter scored over 4600 runs across two white-ball formats, including 10 centuries and 25 fifties. 

According to ESPNcricinfo, Jackson informed the team about his decision before the Punjab game on December 31, his last white-ball fixture. He didn’t play a single match in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, where Saurashtra won six of their seven group-stage fixtures.

"It'd been at the back of my mind from even before the tournament and I kept taking it game by game, but before the Punjab match, I told the team, but they wanted me to bow out on the field. It was a very gracious move from them and I'm really thankful for that gesture,” Jackson told ESPNcricinfo.

"The way Saurashtra's youngsters played during the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy convinced me my time was up. I didn't find it right to be blocking someone's spot. At 37-38, even if I score 5000 runs, I wasn't going to be in the reckoning for the national team. Or say I scored ten ducks, the worse that would've happened is I'd be out of the state team.

"In that sense, there was no scope for growth. What's the point in me holding on to my spot when it wasn't going to lead me anywhere? I rang up Jaydev Shah (the Saurashtra Cricket Association president, who is currently in Australia as the India team manager) and expressed my thoughts and then communicated it to the captain (Jaydev Unadkat) and the coach (Niraj Odedra)."

Jackson last featured in the IPL in 2022 and didn't even register for the auction in the last two seasons. "For the past two years, I hadn't even been registering for the IPL auction. And in all honesty, the motivation for someone to be a part of SMAT, especially if you're not in the reckoning for the Indian team, is to get an IPL gig. If I wasn't even in the auctions, it felt pointless to simply soldier on and block a spot.

"Because even if I wasn't going to be in the XI, chances are I'd be in the 15. And that'd mean blocking the place of one young player. So, in that sense, it really wasn't a hard decision, the time was right.

"I'd communicated the same to the selectors a week before SMAT. I'm not entirely sure how it would've played out - whether I made their decision easier or if it was already decided I won't be a part of it - but I'd decided the best thing to do was communicate clearly."