Tammy Beaumont retires, calls for more women's Test cricket

Tammy Beaumont will end her England career after the one-off Test against India at Lord’s, where she will make her 12th appearance in the format before stepping away from international cricket. The 35-year-old made the decision about a week ago after talks with England Women head coach Charlotte Edwards about where the side was heading, and she said she no longer saw herself in the new-look team.

Beaumont said she had “lost the fire” to keep forcing her way back into contention after being left out of recent squads, including the ODI squad against New Zealand and earlier white-ball selections. She said there was no single “lightbulb moment”; instead, the doubts built after the 50-over World Cup last year. The comparison that finally landed, she said, came when she thought about Ben Stokes and his remarks about “going back to the well.” For Beaumont, that was the point when she accepted she could not keep doing it, and did not want to.

Since her debut in 2009, Beaumont has played 260 matches for England, including 12 Tests, 140 ODIs and 109 T20Is. She retires as England Women’s leading ODI centurion with 12 hundreds, and she and Heather Knight remain the only two English women to have scored centuries in all three international formats.

Beaumont’s career stretched across English women’s cricket’s amateur and professional eras. She was part of the first group of 18 England women’s players to receive central contracts in 2015, after beginning her international career as an amateur. In the 2017 ICC Women’s World Cup, she was player of the tournament and top scorer with 410 runs as England won at home. In 2023, she became the first English woman to score a Test double-century, making 208 against Australia at Trent Bridge during the Women’s Ashes.

The match is the first women’s Test ever staged at the ground in its 212-year history, and Marylebone Cricket Club had already sold around 35,000 tickets, including about 15,000 for day two. Beaumont said Lord’s was the perfect place to sign off and thanked fans, teammates, coaches, support staff and her family for their support.

Beaumont will keep playing domestic cricket for The Blaze and in The Hundred for Birmingham Phoenix.