File photo of New Zealand's Trent Boult and Pakistan's Babar Azam during the ICC World Cup in 2019. (Representative image)
Credit: Reuters File Photo
Tarouba: Veteran pacer Trent Boult has confirmed the ongoing T20 World Cup will be his final appearance for New Zealand in the marquee-tournament.
Since his debut in 2011, Boult has been a key member of the BlackCaps' golden generation, participating in multiple finals across all three formats for New Zealand. Additionally, the left-arm pacer has featured in four editions of the T20 World Cup since 2014.
"Speaking on behalf of myself, this will be my last T20 World Cup. That's all I have to say," Boult said at the press conference after New Zealand's nine-wicket win over Uganda.
Whether Boult will continue to play for New Zealand in any capacity remains uncertain as he had opted out of a central contract in 2022, choosing to play T20 franchise cricket around the world instead.
Despite the huge win against Uganda and a game left in hand, New Zealand have already been eliminated from the race to Super Eight with Afghanistan and West Indies clinching the two spots from Group C.
Effectively, New Zealand's last group game against Papua New Guinea will be the 34-year-old's last T20 World Cup outing.
"Definitely (it was) not the start we wanted in the tournament. A hard one to take. Just gutted we're not going any further. But any time you get to represent the country, it's a proud moment." New Zealand have been a picture of consistency, having qualified made the semifinals of the showpiece every time since 2014.
"There's a lot of pride in the dressing room and in playing for the country, we've had some great records across however many years. Unfortunately we've been off the ball the last couple of weeks and that's what it takes to not qualify.
"It's unfortunate, but there's still some tremendous talent inside that dressing room and coming through the ranks in New Zealand cricket, so we're a proud nation and we'll continue to go that way," he said.
Meanwhile, bowlers have had a successful run in the tournament at the expense of batters' misery on tough wickets in the T20 World Cup, which has had just one 200 plus score thus far. Boult has made the call for restoration of the balance.
"Yeah, it's been a challenge, there's no doubt about it. There's been some very low scores. I've played cricket all around the world recently and you come up with a lot of different conditions.
"It's always a challenge in adapting to conditions, but I think the balance has been far too much on the bowler's side, but they just haven't been very good wickets. It's been a good challenge for bat and ball but it's interesting to see in a world tournament."