Five-time World Cup-winning Australian captain Meg Lanning retires from international cricket

Five times World Cup-winning captain Meg Lanning retired from International Cricket on Thursday at the age of 31 citing the loss of spark to compete at the elite level. Meg Lanning has played for Australia for over 13 years scoring 8,352 runs from 241 innings.

Meg Lanning has been one of the best batters in the history of Women’s cricket and has won 7 World Cups in total which she has led in five of them. Australia has been a force to reckon with in Women’s cricket over the years and Meg Lanning has been the one who has been leading the strong Australian team to these titles over the years.

But in the past year, Lanning has been dealing with mental and physical issues that have kept her unavailable for selection in the Australian team. Finally, Lanning on Thursday in an emotional interview in Melbourne announced her retirement from International cricket as she feels that she does not have the motivation to compete further and she feels that she has nothing left to achieve in the International arena.

'It’s time to move on and go on and experience other things' - Meg Lanning 

That’s why she has decided to move on to take up new things in life other than Cricket. Though she said that she would continue to play domestic cricket such as the Women’s Big Bash League (WBBL) and Women’s Premier League (WPL) in India but called her time on International cricket.

Talking to the media Meg said, “It’s been my life essentially for 13 years, and I know nothing other than that. I’ve learned so much and had so many incredible opportunities to do that, and I’m sad that it’s finishing up but I’m very much ready for something new.

“It’s time to move on and go on and experience other things other than playing cricket which I’m excited about. I guess I feel like I’ve got nothing left to achieve on the international stage and for me I can’t be half in or half out with anything, so I guess that’s where I’ve landed with this decision.”

It was evident that all was not well with her when she took an indefinite break from Cricket after winning Gold for Australia in the Commonwealth Games on grounds of mental health. Lanning then returned at the start of 2023 and went on to lead Australia to the T20 World and won the coveted trophy for the seventh time for Australia.

Unfortunately, she again missed the 2023 Ashes after the World Cup due to medical reasons that gave her time to reflect on her career and played an important role in her coming to this decision. Besides, all this Meg Lanning had an illustrious career in International cricket and will go down as one of the greatest players in Women’s cricket history.