Craig Kieswetter has always been an all or nothing man. When he was catapulted into the England Twenty20 side in the Caribbean in 2010 he might have been cowed by the sudden elevation.
Instead, making a virtue of his naivety, he just went for it in a makeshift opening pairing alongside Nottinghamshire’s Michael Lumb. England, riding a crest of a wave, reached the World Cup final; Kieswetter was man of the match; Australia were defeated and this remains England’s solitary success in an ICC tournament.
Kieswetter, as his brief yet distinguished England career (there were 71 appearances in T20 and the 50-over format) suggests, is a decisive man and on Friday he announced that he had come to a difficult decision: that he would retire from the game at the age of 27 because of an eye injury.
Kieswetter was struck by a ball bowled by David Willey in a Championship match for Somerset against Northamptonshire last July. The ball squeezed between the peak and grille of his helmet and hit his right eye. He returned for Somerset’s penultimate match of the season against Middlesex in September. He scored a brisk 69 and everyone sighed with relief. However, Kieswetter recognised after playing T20 cricket for the Warriors in South Africa in November that his vision had not been fully restored.
Kieswetter consulted the best specialists but, understandably, was not inclined to continue and therefore compromise his career unless there was a complete recovery. He explained that decision-making process: “After being given the opportunity to take some time off and step away from the game, I’ve come to the decision that was not the easiest to make, yet I feel is the right one. Having gone through the experience of my eye injury and everything it entailed, I feel mentally I will never again be the player I was.
“I have had a terrific career with plenty of ups and occasional downs and I am calling time and walking away with no regrets. I’ll have so many memories of a career that spanned nine years of my life during which I have made so many friends. See you all on the sidelines”.
Kieswetter was a dynamic cricketer, a wicketkeeper capable of brilliance rather than elegance, a fierce competitor and a destructive batsman, who relished a tough situation. Back at the start of the 2007 season, when he was 19, the general idea was that he would keep wicket for Somerset in one-day cricket, while Sam Spurway would do the job in the longer format. Brian Rose, the cricket director, and Justin Langer, the captain, soon had a change of heart. In his first match Kieswetter smashed 69 from 58 balls against Glamorgan, he kept impeccably and it was pretty obvious that here was someone special. He had to play all the time.
Soon he became a batsman who could devastate as well as being a forthright presence in every dressing room he inhabited. He spoke his mind, was openly ambitious and could occasionally be provocative. This may have led to his England career ending rather suddenly after a tour to India in 2013. Then Kieswetter was replaced as England’s one-day wicketkeeper by his young county colleague Jos Buttler, which created an uneasy situation at Somerset. At the end of 2013 Buttler left the club to join Lancashire and Kieswetter, with his England career seemingly blocked, focused on county cricket.
There was every indication that he was maturing fast and eager to take up a leadership role with his county. Those plans have now sadly evaporated.
Matt Maynard, Somerset’s director of cricket, said: “At his best Craig was one of, if not the most explosive keeper-batsmen in the game. He could win a match on his own.”
The club’s chief executive, Guy Lavender, acknowledged: “This is awful news but we completely understand why he has come to this difficult decision. Craig has made an immense contribution to the success of Somerset and England”.
It is a sad day for Somerset and Kieswetter. But there is a consolation. Such is his energy and dynamism that he is not likely to be weighed down for too long by such a major setback.
