One of the most promising cricketers in English cricket Will Smeed has signed a white-ball only contract with his county team Somerset, effectively quitting first-class cricket. Though Smeed hasn’t played first-class cricket yet, he came into limelight after scoring a century for Somerset 2nd XI aged 16, in a red-ball game.
While he has produced eye-catching performances for Somerset in T20 Blast, earlier in 2022, the 21-year-old became the first ever player in The Hundred to score a century.
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“I feel that my game is better suited to white-ball cricket," Smeed said in a statement. “After a huge amount of thorough and considered discussions, I feel that I need to solely focus my attention on the limited-overs formats in order to become the very best cricketer I can be."
“I can assure people that this [is] not a decision that I’ve taken lightly, and I’ve spoken to a lot of people about it. I want to be the best player that I can be, and to do that I believe that this needs to be my focus," he added.
Smeed has contract with MI Emirates, a team in UAE’s ILT20 that is owned by Reliance who also own IPL franchise Mumbai Indians. It is expected that Smeed will put up his name for IPL auction to be held in December.
Smeed says he hasn’t been performing to the expectations in red-ball cricket.
“I know how much our members love red-ball cricket, but unfortunately I haven’t been performing how I would like to in the longer form of the game. The easy option would have been to carry on playing red-ball cricket and try to fit everything in and reach a certain level across all formats, but I want to try to be the best that I can be," he said.
“To achieve this, I feel that I need to focus on excelling in one format. I’m certainly not saying that I’ll never play red-ball cricket again. I just feel that this is the right decision for me and Somerset at the current time," he added.
Somerset’s director of cricket Andy Hurry has backed Smeed’s decision and predicted a rise in such contracts in the future.
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“As a club we will continue to do everything we can to ensure that our players fulfil their aspirations, and we therefore support Will in this decision. White-ball only contracts are not new in the game and are not new at Somerset. The game is developing all the time and I sense that we will see more contracts of this type emerging across the world," Hurry said.
He continued, “Will is an exceptional talent and has the potential to have an incredibly successful career. At this stage he is not drawing a permanent line under his red-ball future, and this is currently the best way forward for both Will and the club."
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