Glenn Maxwell Retires from International Cricket: The Big Show’s 13-Year Career Ends at 38
Australia’s Glenn Maxwell has announced his retirement from international cricket, drawing the curtain on a 13-year career that made him one of the most destructive and inventive white-ball batters the game has ever seen. The 38-year-old confirmed the decision on The Final Word podcast, ending speculation about whether he would push on to another home series.
Maxwell, who retired from one-day international cricket in June 2025, has now also called time on his Twenty20 international career — and with it, first-class and List A cricket too.
The podcast announcement that ended the wait
The announcement came on Monday, hours after Maxwell’s name was missing from Australia’s T20 squad to face England later this month. Speaking to Adam Collins and Geoff Lemon — who co-authored and edited his 2024 autobiography — on The Final Word, Maxwell admitted he had held a small hope of one final appearance at his home ground.
“I suppose [I had] a small hope that I might have been able to potentially get a send-off game at the MCG,” he said. “But I can completely understand the direction they’re going with this [T20] squad.”
Maxwell pointed to the changing of the guard in Australian cricket, with the 2028 Olympics on the horizon and selectors keen to test younger players under pressure. “There’s going to be a lot of change over the next 12 to 24 months with the Olympics coming up [in 2028], and they’ve got to make sure they get their eyeballs on a few young guys coming through, making sure they’re getting exposed to international pressure.”
The 201 not out that defined a career
If one innings summed up everything about Glenn Maxwell, it was the impossible 201 not out against Afghanistan at the 2023 ODI World Cup in Mumbai. Walking in with Australia reeling at 91 for 7 and chasing 292, a cramping, barely-mobile Maxwell finished 201 not out from just 128 balls to drag his team into the semi-finals.
He batted for long stretches on one leg, barely able to run, while Pat Cummins held up the other end. It remains the highest individual score by an Australian in ODI cricket and the first double century in a World Cup chase. For a player whose whole career was built on doing the things no one else dared attempt, it was the perfect signature performance.
Career in numbers: 286 matches, three World Cups
Maxwell’s final tally across formats is formidable: 286 international appearances — 149 ODIs, 130 T20Is and seven Tests — yielding 7,226 runs and 136 wickets. He won the ODI World Cup in 2015 and 2023 and the T20 World Cup in 2021.
In T20 internationals he was genuinely elite: 2,897 runs at a strike rate of 154.42 with 51 wickets, making him Australia’s third-highest run-scorer in the format behind David Warner and Aaron Finch. His five T20I hundreds are an Australian record and a tally matched globally only by India’s Rohit Sharma. He is also one of only five Australian men — alongside Shane Watson, David Warner, Josh Inglis and Mitchell Marsh — to score centuries in all three international formats.
His final international appearance came quietly: against Oman at the T20 World Cup in February 2026, where he took 2 for 13 with his off-spin and was not required to bat.
Why now: the England snub and the farewell that never was
Maxwell had kept the door open to international cricket after his ODI retirement, even considering getting himself ready for Australia’s home T20 series against England, which includes a match in Melbourne on 21 November. But selectors bypassed him for the Bangladesh tour in June and again for the England series, and the message was clear.
The Victorian admitted telling his state teammates that his last one-day game for Victoria was the end hit harder than expected. “Speaking to my teammates and letting them know that was gonna be my last game for the state was probably harder than I thought it was going to be — got a little choked up,” he said. He has not played first-class cricket since 2023, and his last Test came against Bangladesh back in 2017.
What’s next: the Big Bash and franchise cricket
Retirement from international and state cricket does not mean retirement from the game. Maxwell remains one of the most sought-after T20 freelancers in world cricket and will line up for the Melbourne Stars in the upcoming Big Bash season, which opens on 18 December against Adelaide at the MCG.
Fans in Pakistan will also keep seeing him in franchise leagues around the world — and the Pakistan Super League has been one of the competitions where his box-office style has always been a natural fit for local crowds who love fearless batting.
Legacy: the original 360-degree showman
Long before “360-degree batting” became a cliché, Maxwell was playing reverse sweeps, switch hits and scoops as a matter of routine — shots that coaches once warned young players never to attempt. Nicknamed “The Big Show”, he turned fielding into theatre too, with a rocket arm and acrobatic catches that made him one of the finest all-round fielders of his generation.
His career was never the smooth accumulation of a traditional great; it was bursts of genius separated by fallow spells, public debates about his place in the side, and comebacks that silenced the doubters. That volatility was the point. On his day, there was no more watchable cricketer on the planet — and his day arrived often enough to fill three World Cup winner’s medals.
As Australia’s selectors turn to youth with an eye on the 2028 Olympics, the international game says goodbye to a genuine original. The Big Show, as they say, is over — but the highlights will be replayed for decades.
For more on Pakistan’s own white-ball stars and upcoming fixtures, see our guide to the Pakistan cricket team squad and schedule for 2026. The full details of Maxwell’s announcement were first reported by Sky Sports and ESPNcricinfo.
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