Eoin Morgan said he would have felt like a “cheater” if he had played one more game for England after waking up in Amsterdam last week and realizing his career was over.
Morgan made two ducks in the first two games and pulled out the third with an old injury. On Monday, two days before the third match in the series, he was gripped by a gripping realization that a 16-year international career, which began with Ireland in 2006, is over.
“I remember going to sleep when I wrote notes on various different things, team-oriented at the World Cup, how to get there, what we do … ordinary things I do. And I slept well. “I woke up the next morning with just a very different feeling, one I had never had before,” he said.
“And it’s hard to describe unless you go through it, I did a lot of research over the last three years in the run-up to this transition and talked to a lot of different players about it. The most common theme is ‘it’s a feeling’. If you know, you know and I always thought they were full of s —. Sincerely, I always sat there thinking ‘I’m not sure about it’, because I’m not through it yet, and I did not know it. But Monday is how it felt. “
He could have possibly played one last game, but chose to step aside, with Jos Buttler leading the team instead to a victory in the last one-day game in Amsterdam and he will be at the end of the week as his full-time successor is appointed.
“It is completely unfair, and it also goes against everything I stand for. “I would have felt just like a cheater,” Morgan said. “It is a highlight to be away for a considerable time, over a long career, to make decisions, to build relationships, to have to do it constantly. I have reached the end of the road. ”