It happened without fanfare or ceremony. A quiet alert on the Cricket Australia app popped up with the news of Meg Lanning’s international retirement and immediately tributes began flowing in. The announcement, which came after almost 10 years in the captaincy role, sent shock waves around the cricketing world.
However, the writing has been on the wall for some time, with Lanning taking two breaks in recent times – one for mental health reasons in 2022, followed by another for undisclosed medical reasons in 2023. It is unlikely the public will ever know the full story behind either of these breaks or indeed Lanning’s retirement. She is an intensely private person – an increasing rarity in the social media age – and these reasons are likely to be kept close to her chest, shared only with her nearest and dearest.
