Lockdown helps Finch settle on retirement date

Australia captain Aaron Finch says the enforced break due to the COVID-19 pandemic has affirmed his desire to play for another three years and retire at the end of the 2023 ODI World Cup in India.

Finch, 33, plans to lead Australia in white-ball cricket to the next three major tournaments; the T20 events in 2021 and 2022 and then the 50-over showpiece a year later.

Forced into a rare extended break this year due to the pandemic, Finch says spending five months at home has freshened him up and silenced any doubt he had that the 2023 tournament would be a bridge too far.

"My end date at this stage is the World Cup final of the 2023 World Cup in India," he told SEN. "That's my goal and I’m sticking to it.

"That's what I had my mind set on a fair while (ago), but I think this period has just confirmed it.

"That'll see me through to 36 (years old), obviously with form and everything permitting, and injuries.

"Having this break, as difficult as it's been for so many people, for athletes and especially ones that are travelling nonstop and playing for 10 or 11 months of the year, it's been that mental freshen up that people probably needed but haven't had the opportunity to do.

"If I thought I was going to be pushing it to get to that date, this break has confirmed that I'll be ready to go right through to that period."

Finch's long-time opening partner David Warner, also 33, has also expressed a desire to keep playing until at least the 2023 tournament.

The left-hander, who missed more than a year of international cricket in 2018-19 due to a 12-month ban, has also benefitted from another unexpected break in the normally relentless schedule.

"In the last three years I'll have had almost two years off, depending on when we play cricket again," Warner said in May.

"The longevity in your body helps. The get ups of training and playing gets harder as you get older but I haven't felt any fitter in my career than I do now.

"As the legs get older time will tell. At the moment I'm feeling as fit as a fiddle and if I can keep running between wickets as well as I have done, who knows.

"That (2023 ODI) World Cup is the ultimate goal."

Finch will fly from Melbourne to Perth on Sunday to start the long journey to England for Australia's white-ball tour there next month, which will end six months without any competitive cricket.

Despite enjoying a long period of time at home, he says he's now motivated to start playing again as he looks ahead to playing three World Cups in three years.

"The first month or so that we were in lockdown, I didn't miss playing at all," he said.

"So originally, that was alarm bells for me; (I thought) does this mean I'm coming to the end, do I retire?

"And it was like that 32nd day (of no training) ticked over and I was like, 'right, I’m itching to get back into it'.

"I'm just excited to start playing again. It's been a long five months and I think for everyone having not had this kind of extended break for some time, I think the novelty of that wore off after the first three months and everyone's been itching to get back into it since then."

Australia's tour of the UK starts with the first of three T20s in Southampton on September 4.