Rahul Dravid to quit ODI and Twenty20 cricket after England series
August 7th, 2011 - 2:04 am ICT by IANS
London, Aug 8 (IANS) Hours after the surprise recall to the India One-Day squad, Rahul Dravid Saturday announced his decision to quit the shorter versions of the game at the end of the series in England.
The highly dependable batsman with three hundreds in the last five Tests in the West Indies and in the ongoing series in England, said he was quitting the ODIs and Twenty20s so that he could concentrate on Test cricket.
Dravid, 38, who has not played much one-day cricket in the last four years after being dumped by the national selectors in the wake of a none-too-successful home series against Australia soon after the disastrous 2003 World Cup under his captaincy save for a brief return for the 2009 Champions Trophy in South Africa, admitted the latest recall was totally unexpected.
“Since I had not been picked for one-day cricket for the last two years, I was obviously a little surprised,” he said after the warm-up game at Northampton.
“To be honest, I had not informed the selectors or the board of my intention to focus only on Test cricket because I had not been picked.”
“Now that I am in the one-day side, I am committed as always to give my best in this ODI series against England and thereafter the Tests I play.”
Dravid, like his teammate Sachin Tendulkar, has over 10,000 runs in both the Test and ODI cricket, with 10,765 runs in 339 one-dayers — the seventh highest scorer in that format.
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- Rahul 'The Wall' Dravid hangs up Test boots (Roundup) - Mar 09, 2012
- Ashraful feels he was not given a fair chance by selectors - Oct 20, 2011
- Dravid gears up for his ODI swan song at Cardiff - Sep 15, 2011
- Rahul 'The Wall' Dravid bids Test cricket adieu (Lead) - Mar 09, 2012
- Rahul Dravid, a gentleman-cricketer to the core (Profile) - Mar 09, 2012
- Bangladesh recalls Shahadat for Windies series - Oct 01, 2011
- Dhoni wins World Cup but India loses No 1 Test status (2011 in Retrospect - Cricket) - Dec 21, 2011
- Dravid's recall exposes India's brittle batting order: Akram - Aug 07, 2011
- Kevin Pietersen retires from ODIs and T20s - May 31, 2012
- Simmons keen to play in ODIs against England - May 09, 2012
- England hoping to blank India in ODIs too: Bresnan - Aug 30, 2011
- Empty stands not good advertisement for cricket: Dravid - Dec 14, 2011
- It does not feel like I'm finishing: Dravid - Sep 15, 2011
Tags: batsman, champions trophy, dravid, england series, India, intention, national selectors, northampton, odi cricket, odi series, odis, scorer, south africa, surprise, teammate, tendulkar, test cricket, twenty20 cricket, west indies, world cup