Explained: Why Nicholas Pooran has retired from international cricket aged 29

There are multiple factors that went into Pooran cutting his international career short. He hadn't featured for his country for six months before making the announcement. He opted out of touring England with the side this summer, and hadn't featured in the 50-over format since West Indies failed to qualify for the 2023 World Cup.

However, speaking last year after playing his 100th T20I, Pooran said, "I feel like I can play 100 more".

"Hearing the West Indies anthem and seeing the fans celebrating West Indies cricket is what makes me happy," Pooran went on to say at that time. "As a little boy growing up, I used to love to see Brian Lara and hearing Ian Bishop's voice on TV, that's what I enjoyed as a young fan… so that inspired me."

Nevertheless, after playing only six more T20Is following that game, Pooran is set to add no more to his tally, unless an unretirement is on the cards. Here's a look at the background of his decision.

International ascendancy

Having almost had his career derailed by a car accident the previous year, Pooran made his T20I debut for the West Indies in 2016 and was first picked in the ODI format in 2019, ahead of that year's World Cup. In a thrilling game of that competition, he scored his first international century, hitting 118 in a tight chase against Sri Lanka which West Indies ultimately failed to make. A first central contract from Cricket West Indies followed that tournament, in which Pooran was West Indies' leading run scorer.

During this time, Pooran had been making a steady rise in the T20I side, scoring an unbeaten half-century against India in 2018. There was however, a brief blip in his rise, when he was found guilty of ball tampering in a match against Afghanistan in late 2019, caught on camera using his thumbnail to scratch the ball. "I recognise that I made an extreme error in judgement and I fully accept the ICC penalty," Pooran said at the time. "I want to assure everyone that this is an isolated incident and it will not be repeated. I promise to learn from this and come back stronger and wiser."

That didn't prevent him, however, from being named West Indies' T20I vice-captain in 2021 for their series against Australia, eventually leading the side for the first time when Kieron Pollard was ruled out. West Indies won that series 4-1 and Pooran was named vice-captain for that year's T20 World Cup. The following year, he was named captain of West Indies in both white-ball formats.

Increasing franchise demand, and international captaincy

Pooran was first picked up in an IPL auction in 2017, bought by Mumbai Indians for 30 lakhs, but didn't play a match. He went unsold in the 2018 auction, but was bought by Kings XI Punjab for 4.2 crores in 2019. Batting in the middle-order, Pooran hit 25 sixes that season and averaged 35.30 with a strike rate just under 170. That year was a springboard for his rising stock on the franchise circuit, as he eventually went on to represent MI New York in the MLC, as well as playing in the BPL, PSL, ILT20 and The Hundred. In 2024, he broke the record for the most T20 runs scored and sixes hit in a calendar year.

In the international arena, however, Pooran faced constant availability questions, as franchise commitments and fitness concerns of several of their best players prevented a full-strength West Indies side from getting on the park. There was also the 2022 T20 World Cup debacle, where West Indies failed to make it out of the Qualifier round, after delayed arrivals from missed flights and players arriving in Australia 35 hours after that year's CPL final. A month after his side's failure at the tournament, Pooran stepped down as captain, having won just eight of the 30 matches West Indies' played under his tenure.

Now freer to pursue the vast rewards available to a player of his calibre and with his boundary-scoring ability on the franchise circuit, Pooran turned down a central contract in 2023 – a contract which would have earned him just over a tenth of his IPL salary. Despite that, he played 34 T20Is for West Indies after relinquishing the captaincy, hitting half-centuries against India and England in 2023, before falling two runs short of a T20I half-century against Afghanistan last year.

A crowded 2025

Pooran opted not to tour England in the six-match white-ball series over May and June in order to recover from his IPL commitments – with the competition due not to overlap with the series before it's postponement. Pooran played 11 matches in the ILT20 earlier this year, before playing every one of Lucknow's matches in the IPL.

He is also slated to play for MI New York in the MLC, which begins on June 13, three days after the final match of West Indies' series in England. A month after the end of that tournament, Pooran will be playing in the CPL. If he was playing for West Indies, that month of rest would be taken up by a five-match T20I series against Australia, followed by three T20Is against Pakistan, ahead of the busy franchise winter period, and a T20 World Cup on the horizon in early 2026.

Nevertheless, having never played Test cricket and with his last ODI now almost two years ago, there are valid questions over how much his bilateral T20I commitments would add to his workload.

While there's no official confirmation on the reasons for Pooran's retirement, it seems likely the busy franchise calendar where breaks are taken up by international cricket has fuelled his decision. With far higher financial rewards from franchise contracts compared to West Indies' central contracts, throwing his lot in with the former in order to recover during international windows is likely how Pooran sees his most lucrative future.

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