Glenn Maxwell has retired from international cricket. The 38-year-old Australian is also walking away from first-class cricket and the List A game. He will be available to play for the Melbourne Stars in the BBL having had his contract extended to the 2027-28 season.
Maxwell had already quit ODIs in June last year but had kept himself available for T20Is and played the short-format World Cup in 2026 where his team was unable to progress past the group stages. Australia's final match of that tournament, against Oman in February, becomes the last game he ever played for his country. He picked up two wickets with the ball and did not bat.
"We probably had numerous discussions before and after the T20 World Cup," Maxwell said on the Final Word podcast. "And it was it was pretty open ended. There wasn't any pressure from that side [Australia team management], and we decided to sort of leave the door open. There was a couple of series that were coming up; they were going to look to the future, and we saw that in Bangladesh with guys getting their opportunity and performing really well."
A two-time ODI World Cup winner and scorer of the winning runs when Australia were crowned T20 world champions in 2021, Maxwell wished he could've taken the field one last time for his nation at his home ground.
"I suppose, a small hope or discussion that I might have been able to potentially get a send-off game at the MCG. But I can completely understand the direction they're going with this squad. There's going to be a lot of change, I suppose, over the next 12 to 24 months with the Olympics coming up [in 2028], and they've got to make sure that they get their eyeballs on a few young guys coming through and making sure that they're getting exposed to international pressure that you probably can't always get from a BBL fixture."
Maxwell has remained active in the franchise circuit and led Belfast Wolves to the final of the inaugural European T20 Premier League in September. Five days later, he represented Victoria for two matches in the One-Day Cup.
"Post the last one-day game for Victoria, speaking to my team-mates and letting them know that that was going to be my last game for the state was probably harder than I thought it was going to be. Knowing that they've played such a huge role in my whole career, every time I've come back, had great team-mates there and a lot of support from the state. Yeah, I certainly got a little bit choked up speaking front of the group, but yeah, it's probably a time where I probably need to spend a little bit more time investing in the in the body to make sure I can get through the remaining couple of tournaments I've got in my career."
England are about to visit for a white-ball series which includes a T20I in Melbourne and Maxwell had been tempted to try and get himself ready for it.
"The option was there, but I was sort of ready to push the button on getting an injection on my knee to make sure I was ready for the BBL. So there was sort of a positive either way. And as soon as that door was shut, I was able to start to put some time back into my body. Eight weeks of solid rehab again to make sure I'm strong and ready for for the BBL coming up. So probably just the small fairy tale that you sort of see these your heroes and idols sort of go through. You start to sort of let your mind drift towards that, and probably no other format I probably would have asked for it, except for this one, where I feel like it's been it's almost felt like home over the last 15 years."
Maxwell played 130 T20Is for Australia and scored 2897 runs (and 51 wickets) at a strike rate of 154.42. He has five centuries in the format, which is a world record he holds jointly with Rohit Sharma. He was capped seven times in Test cricket - the last of which came in 2017 - and picked up 339 runs with a best of 104 against India in Ranchi.