PAK vs ENG: "I Wondered If I'd Go White-Ball Only..." - England Pacer Mark Wood Reveals He Considered Retiring From Red Ball Cricket Due To Injuries

England defeated Pakistan by 26 runs in the second Test at the Multan Cricket Stadium. They won the series with one match to spare and took an unassailable 2-0 lead in the three-match series. England fast bowler Mark Wood has admitted to thinking about retirement from Test cricket earlier this year during his long injury layoff.

Mark Wood missed the first Test in Rawalpindi due to a hip injury but made an impressive comeback in the second Test in Multan. The right-arm bowler was outstanding and rattled the Pakistan batsmen with his quick pace in the second innings. He dismissed Saud Shakeel and Mohammad Nawaz, who were taking the game away from the visitors, and ended the second innings with figures of 4/65.

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I’m Pleased I’ve Stuck With It – Mark Wood

Mark Wood was sidelined for more than four months due to an injury sustained during the West Indies tour in March, which necessitated surgery. The 32-year-old revealed at the time that he was considering retiring from red-ball cricket and sticking to white-ball cricket due to an aging body.

“Well, in fact, yes. I wondered if I’d go white-ball only. At some my point my body will say that it’s the way to go, but I didn’t prepare for the white-ball, I prepared for all cricket,” Wood said ahead of the third Test in Karachi.

“I desperately wanted to experience all this, with Stokesy and Brendon, so I’m pleased I’ve stuck with it. And I’m pleased we won here. I’d have been gutted if we’d won, I’d come in, and we’d lost. They’d have been pointing fingers at me” he added.

Stokesy Now Is Much More Mature – Mark Wood

Under the leadership of Ben Stokes, England played an aggressive brand of cricket and won eight out of nine Tests. Mark Wood played with Stokes at the Durham Academy and described him as a world-class cricketer.

“It’s weird, the lad I grew up with, Stokesy now is much more mature. He speaks so well, he’s always had a fantastic cricket brain. But the way he comes across, the way he conducts himself and the messages that he gives, he’s just so much more rounded than when we were growing up,” Wood said.

“He was this alpha guy who would whack it, never back down. He’s still got all that, but he’s got other sides to him now. He’ll put an arm round people, express what he means really articulately. I didn’t think he had some of the words in his locker. But he’s been world-class, to be fair.”

Also Read: PAK vs ENG: “I Can’t Pull Any Truck, But It’s Great To Replicate Someone Like Him” – Mark Wood Reacts To Shoaib Akhtar’s Comment

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