5 stars who announced their international retirement in 2018
2018 seems to have been a year of retirements - from several India domestic stars to some of the biggest names in world cricket, the game has lost a lot of talent over the last 10 months or .
Sri Lanka's Rangana Herath recently declared that he would retire from international cricket after the first Test against England, bringing an end to a long and fruitful career. However, he is not the only big name to retire from the game recently.
In India, several known names, such as Praveen Kumar, RP Singh, Parwinder Awana et al decided to hang up their boots. Across the world, there were other players like Niall O'Brien, Jonathan Trott, Nick Compton, Abdur Rehman, amongst others, who decided they had had enough with the game.
While the list is diverse, there were several big names, who were popular over the years, but won't be continuing their cricket journey next year.
Here are the other big names who took the call to retire from international cricket this year.
#5 Alastair Cook
At one point, Cook was cruising along at the rate of knots towards Sachin Tendulkar's seemingly untouchable Test numbers. When in peak form (and it happened quite a few times in his career), Cook was the biggest enemy for bowlers, especially because of his ability to stay put in the middle for hours and not lose his concentration.
He retired as England's most successful batsman and a modern-day great, stepping back at just the right time, while being in decent form with the bat. His contribution at the top of the order for England cricket will be hard to emulate.
A legend at Essex, Cook hung up his boots at 33, with 12472 Test runs to his name.