Saurashtra veteran Sheldon Jackson retires from first-class cricket after team's loss in Ranji Trophy quarters

Veteran Saurashtra batter Sheldon Jackson has called it time to his first-class career, having played his last red-ball match in the Ranji Trophy quarterfinal against Gujarat. 

Saurashtra suffered a heavy loss against Gujarat in the quarterfinal of the tournament at the Niranjan Shah Stadium, Rajkot as they were blown away by an innings and 98 runs in quarterfinal four. Jackson, 38, hit 14 and 27 in his final two outings as his team could muster only 216 and 197 in the two innings. 

Jackson has been a brilliant cricketer and brings different facets to the game. He is a reliable batter with over 7000 runs in the first-class format and a great fielder. He has also had experience of keeping wickets.

Jackson had earlier announced his retirement from limited-overs cricket. "It'd been at the back of my mind from even before the tournament and I kept taking it game by game, but before the Punjab match, I told the team, but they wanted me to bow out on the field. It was a very gracious move from them and I'm really thankful for that gesture,"



Jackson had said to ESPNCricinfo at the time of his white-ball retirement. 

Jackson had then said that he wanted to continue in the red-ball format.  "I still want to keep going in first-class cricket, at least for these two games, and then take it from there. I really don't know for how long. But my immediate focus is to try and see if I can help contribute towards us making the knockouts. It's tough but it's still possible. And from there, I'll reassess after the two games about my red-ball future. I've had the complete support of the team and Jaydev and Niranjan Shah. I hope I can finish on a high," Jackson added.

Jackson was part of the Kolkata Knight Riders set-up after being spotted by Joydeep Mukherjee, a former Bengal player. He was on the fringes of his state side for three years and made his debut for Saurashtra in December 2011. He hit four fifties and three hundred in the 2012-13 Ranji season, which helped Saurashtra qualify for the final for the first time. On the back of his domestic form, he landed into the India A team for the series against West Indies A.