One of the finest all-rounders India has ever produced, Irfan Pathan announced his retirement from all forms for cricket on Saturday.
Spanning a career of almost 16 years, Pathan has played 120 One-day internationals and 29 tests, picking up 173 and 100 wickets respectively. In the 24 T20 internationals, he has 28 wickets to his name. Pathan last played his international game back in 2012.
Looking back at his career, unarguably, Irfan Pathan will go down as one of the better all-rounders India has ever produced.
Pathan came into limelight when he produced a stellar spell of swing bowling, picking 9 wickets, including a hat-trick against Bangladesh in the Asian under-19 tournament. It didn’t take too long for him to break into the International circuit as he was handed his debut cap on the Australia tour of 2003-04. His range of variations and the skill of swinging both ways received a whole lot of praise and thereby became a popular name in Indian cricket at just 19 years of age.
Irfan’s first half of his career was a stupendous one, however, the same cannot be said on the latter half where he could only play a handful of games for India for various reasons.
On Saturday, Irfan took to twitter to announce his retirement from all forms of cricket and tweets have been pouring in since then from all quarters. His former IPL team CSK bid a special farewell to Irfan Pathan Chennai Super Kings posted a heart-warming message on Twitter.
Super farewell to the only man who's claimed a hat-trick in the first over of a Test match! Here's wishing a smooth transition from the First Over Show to First Day First Show! #Yellove you always. #WhistlePodu 🦁💛 pic.twitter.com/oZhVMr1IKm
— Chennai Super Kings (@ChennaiIPL) January 4, 2020
“Super farewell to the only man who’s claimed a hat-trick in the first over of a Test match! Here’s wishing a smooth transition from the First Over Show to First Day First Show! #Yellove you always.” CSK wrote on their twitter handle.
To this, Irfan Pathan, who is gearing up for his first Tamil movie, replied in Tamil.
Romba Nandri 🙏🙏 ungaloda intha anbum aatharavu than enakku eppavum theva 🙏 Namma pullingo ellam happy aagura maathri puthu avatharathula seekirama varen 😊
— Irfan Pathan (@IrfanPathan) January 5, 2020
“Romba Nandri ?? ungaloda intha anbum aatharavu than enakku eppavum theva ? Namma pullingo ellam happy aagura maathri puthu avatharathula seekirama varen ?” He wrote on Twitter.
