Tilan sticks to his guns; quits despite sops from SLC

Was shocked with omission from squad against Bangladesh

ESPNCricinfo: Thilan Samaraweera has retired from international cricket after being left out of the Sri Lanka squad for the first Test against Bangladesh in Galle, which starts on March 8. Samaraweera had sent a letter to Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) on Tuesday informing it of his intention and the board has now accepted his decision.

"I was shocked with my omission from the squad against Bangladesh," Samaraweera said, adding he had been told by the selectors that they may need him to play Pakistan later this year."There was no point in waiting for nine months. I respect the decision of the selectors to go with young players and decided it was the right time for me to retire."

SLC wanted him to play against Bangladesh - perhaps a farewell Test - but Samaraweera declined because he felt the time was right to retire.

At 36, Samaraweera was the oldest member of Sri Lanka's touring party of Australia, where he was woeful with the bat, making 79 runs in six innings. He reclaimed form in Sri Lanka's first-class competition since then, hitting 464 runs at 92.8 in four matches. Samaraweera was originally left out of Sri Lanka's preliminary Test squad for the Bangladesh series, but was later called into that squad when Mahela Jayawardene's finger injury ruled him out of the series. He could not find a place in the final 16, however.

In a letter to media, Samaraweera thanked the coaches, clubs, team-mates and family who had supported him through his career, and laid out the reason for his retirement. "Although I have not lost the power of my passion to make a comeback, my ethics of reasoning does not interest me to do so at this hour where the obvious focus should be to find a balance in the prospects we have for the future," he said.

Samaraweera has played 81 Tests, and scored 5462 runs at 48.76, with 14 hundreds. He was primarily an offspinner at the beginning of his domestic career, but transformed himself into a secure, if dour, middle-order batsman, in order to break into the Sri Lanka side in the time of Muttiah Muralitharan. He also played 53 ODIs, but his conservative style of play never made him a natural fit for the shorter formats, even after he began improving his stroke range later on in his career.