On this day (23 August) in 2015, former Australia captain Michael Clarke retired from all forms of cricket after the final Test of the Ashes series. A right-handed middle-order batter, an occasional left-arm orthodox spinner and a vigilant slip fielder – Clarke was a huge asset to the Australian team in all three formats.
The New South Wales cricketer made his international debut in the one-day format in early 2003. It did not take much time for him to impress the team management. He had a wide range of shots in his arsenal and excellent footwork against spinners. A Test call awaited him and he finally made his debut in the traditional format in October 2004.
Known for his elegant stroke play, Clarke made his debut in all formats in 2005 when he took the field in a T20I match against New Zealand. Although he racked up a huge amount of runs in ODIs as well, the 43-year-old established himself as a Test prodigy. By the time of his retirement, Clarke had accumulated 17,112 runs from 394 matches across formats.
A closer look at his stats shows that the right-hander has represented Australia in 115 Tests, making him the then-sixth most-capped captain in their cricket history. Moreover, he is Australia’s sixth-highest run-scorer with 8,643 runs and was also at the top of the men’s Test ranking at his peak.
Coming to limited-overs cricket, Clarke played 245 ODIs and 34 T20Is for Australia, scoring 7981 and 488 runs, respectively. He also has 36 centuries, four double hundreds and 86 half-centuries across three formats. The left-arm spinner has taken 31 wickets in Tests, 57 in ODIs and six in the shorter format of the game.
He was the captain of the Australian team in both Test and ODIs between 2011 and 2015. Notably, under his leadership, the Men in Yellow won the 2015 Cricket World Cup. He also served as captain of the T20 team between 2007 and 2010. As a player, he won the 2007 Cricket World Cup and the 2006 ICC Champions Trophy.
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