When players enter the national stage, they will be remembered in either a good or bad way. It strongly depends on how they perform on the field and behave outside the arena.
There are two stories that can attest to this.
New Zealand's all-time leading run scorer, Kane Williamson, has retired from international cricket; effective immediately.
The shock announcement comes after he played in the first Test against England at Lord's, bringing to an end a career spanning 16 years and including a staggering 19 346 international runs.
Williamson captained his country for eight years between 2016 and 2024, with his side winning the World Test Championship in 2021 and reaching two ICC World Cup finals in that period.
"I've thought about it for a while but over the last few days it's become clear now is the right time," Williamson said in a press release."
"I've always felt a strong drive and hunger for international cricket, and I take pride in knowing I've given it my all in every match I've played for New Zealand. Continuing with anything less wouldn't be right and I feel fortunate to step away on my own terms."
"I leave feeling optimistic about where this group is heading. There's a huge amount of talent and a real desire to do something special with this New Zealand team. It's a team I love and I feel incredibly fortunate to have been part of it for so long. It will continue to be dear to my heart."
Williamson scored 18 across two innings in his final Test; the defeat at Lord's. His last international dismissal an lbw decision for Josh Tongue as his side lost by 115 runs - but that ending doesn't do justice to a career that will go down in cricketing history.
The Kiwi batter was part of the 'Fab Four' alongside Virat Kohli, Joe Root and Steve Smith - with the group widely regarded as comprising the four best batters in the world over the last decade.
He notched the most international centuries (48) and double centuries (6) for his nation, while boasting the highest win percentage of any New Zealand Test captain at 55%; with 22 wins in 40 Tests.
The former New Zealand captain finishes with a staggering Test average of 54.06 over 110 Tests, the Black Caps' highest ever and the 21st highest in Test cricket history.
In 2016, Williamson - then 25 - was the youngest player in history to score a century against all major Test-playing nations; including 131 on debut against India in Ahmedabad at 20 years old.
"Anyone who has had the privilege of working with Kane understands he is a special player and person," Black Caps head coach, Rob Walter, said.
His Test record is the standout – 110 appearances producing a batting average of 54 – but Williamson found his way against the white ball, too. He captained New Zealand at Lord’s in the 2019 World Cup final, boundary count denying his side the title; Williamson was named player of the tournament for his 578 runs at an average of 83.
The right-hander began his Test career in 2010 with a debut hundred in Ahmedabad, his early feats commanding the respect of the former New Zealand captain, Martin Crowe.
In a 2014 article for ESPNcricinfo, Crowe placed Williamson in the "Fab Four" alongside Virat Kohli, Joe Root and Steve Smith; up-and-comers he predicted would captain their countries and take turns as the No 1-ranked Test batter in the world. The late Crowe was right on both counts.
Williamson topped the Test rankings for the first time in 2015, finishing that calendar year with 1 172 runs at an average of 90 and hundreds in England and Australia. He was soon named a Wisden Cricketer of the Year. He is the first of Crowe’s quartet to depart international cricket completely and the second to leave Tests after Kohli’s retirement last year.
The enduring image he leaves is of those soft hands guiding the ball to third man. With modern batting turning more muscular, he was the arm-guard purist who kept up with the rest; having his fun in the franchise circus.
As captain of Sunrisers Hyderabad, Williamson took the team to the final of the 2018 Indian Premier League, finishing as the tournament’s leading run scorer. Arguably his finest stroke was a six: a nerveless, match-ending blow off Pat Cummins, down the ground, in a World Cup classic against Australia in 2015.
While a mid-series retirement is a shock; the end has been coming for a while. Williamson declined a New Zealand central contract in 2024, reducing his international commitments and joined Lucknow Super Giants in the IPL last year as a "strategic advisor."
"Anyone who’s had the privilege of working with Kane understands he is a very special player and person," said Rob Walter. "His numbers and batting skills speak for themselves, but it’s what he means to this Black Caps team, as well as world cricket – that will be his legacy. His impact on the culture and standards of this team will remain embedded in its DNA."
“Kane’s always put the team first and although we’re disappointed to see him go, we’re happy to know he’s content and at peace with his decision. An incredible player, awesome team-mate, a wonderful leader and a fantastic ambassador for our sport.”
Meanwhile, English captain, Ben Stokes, has been in hot water.
England's Director of Cricket, Rob Key, has denied that England men's Test team are "a national embarrassment" but hasn't ruled out sacking Ben Stokes as captain after an incident in a Chelsea nightclub in the early hours of Monday morning. England's managing director is also considering a complete alcohol ban following this latest indiscretion.
The ECB have spent the last few days ascertaining the details of a fracas, 12 hours after the conclusion of the first Test against New Zealand on Sunday, involving Stokes, Gus Atkinson and Saracens rugby club academy player, Totoa Auvaa. The incident left England team security liaison officer, James Shaw, requiring stitches.
The board have launched their own internal investigation, alongside the Cricket Regulator. It will only be at the conclusion of that investigation that an official punishment will be handed to Stokes and Atkinson who, for now, have been stood down from the second Test (17 June).
What details have been corroborated, with the help of a report from Shaw, suggest Stokes and Atkinson weren't the aggressors in the situation. They had joined the Saracens team who had embarked on an all-day drinking session to mark the end of their season and went on to The Rex Rooms on Kings Road, where the incident took place.
Stokes and Atkinson are under scrutiny for breaking the ECB's midnight curfew, which has been in place from the start of the year and applies throughout the series; including the current 10-day gap between the first and second Test.
Those special measures were brought in after an Ashes winter riddled with stories of excessive boozing, including Harry Brook's own fracas with a nightclub bouncer in Wellington - an incident that ultimately resulted in the Test vice-captain and one-day skipper being overlooked for Joe Root to lead the second Test. For Stokes and Atkinson to have fallen foul of the curfew after the very first match of the home summer is a damning indictment of the entire England set-up.
Speaking to the media on Thursday at The Kia Oval, the venue for the second Test, Key cut a forlorn figure, acknowledging that the incident has undone months of work to instill greater professionalism within the group. However, he took umbrage with the suggestion the Test side has reached new levels of shame.
"No, I don't think they've become a national embarrassment," he said. "I think that Stokes and McCullum are two of the most successful coach and captain partnerships we've had.
"I feel disappointed that I'm here talking about this because there's so much we've tried to learn from. And I believe that, as a team, the way that they've carried themselves in the lead-up to this game, the way they've played that Test match, everything that we spent so long working on… the breathing space you felt and the relief when we won that Test match; that was so important too because the noise would have got incredibly loud had we not won that Test match. To then be now talking about this, not even a day later, is just incredibly frustrating."
Key's anger is shared by McCullum, who informed Key of the incident on Monday morning. They, along with Stokes, were instrumental in the curfew coming into being and they chose to apply it prior to the Ashes review.
The silver lining, from Key's perspective, is that - while Atkinson claimed to not know about the curfew - other players who were out after the Test win decided to head back to the hotel before midnight.
"The protocols were brought in in January, they were also sent to their representatives at TEPP (Team England Player Partnership, the body that represents England's men). A number of players went out that night and all but two of them came back in time for the curfew."
"Gus Atkinson says he didn't know. Ben Stokes and I have spent probably three months working through a lot of things on how we improve the culture, the performance, everything with this team. He's been an integral part of that. As far as I'm concerned, as much as I'm angry and frustrated at sitting here having to talk through this. If those protocols weren't in place it could have been a lot worse.
"A lot of people have had phone calls that you're just in disbelief with. Then you get angry. There's a load of things and I'm still not sure I'm over those at the moment. Ben, we are speaking to all the time. Part of it for me is just making sure he's alright because in my dealings with Ben in this job he has been outstanding."
"Over the last few months we have spent so much time together talking and working out the way forward,and I thought some of those things were starting to come to fruition on the pitch. To then very quickly be talking about this is not where I want to be."
Key's frustration is such that he is even considering a complete ban on alcohol. After McCullum spoke about getting a tighter grip on the dressing room, Key wonders if it could be tighter still.
"I'm trying to give myself a bit of time," he said. "Do we need to look at, actually, have [the measures] been strict enough? Even when they win a game of cricket, is it now a time when there's just no alcohol at any time and at any stage? I need to think through these things, because I don't want to make a rash decision that actually hinders the team and creates a situation where they don't feel they can do anything. But the players now have to show the public that they can be trusted. At this point it's hard to say they can."
The fallout from the incident has so far centred on the uncertainty surrounding Stokes. He was initially understood to have been contemplating retiring from international cricket, but is now thought to have cooled on that option.
Key would not be drawn on the prospect of the Stokes stepping away from the game, revealing the 35-year old had gone through "a range of emotions" because of the incident, particularly after a tough six months following the Ashes; which included a gruesome facial injury after an accident in the nets.
Key hasn't asked Stokes to step down, but he did not rule out the prospect of removing Stokes as captain following the conclusion of the ECB's investigation.
"I'm not saying that," Key said, when asked specifically if he wouldn't sack Stokes. "At this point in time, it has not crossed my mind to get that far ahead. It's just about finding out all the information, finding out how he is, putting all that information together and working out what the best thing to do is. As far as sacking, or any of that stuff, no we haven't got anywhere close to being that far in the process."
"We have to let that process play out, because I want to work out what the best thing to do for this team is, and the best thing to do for Ben Stokes. I haven't got an answer at the moment."
"It's still very raw all of this - certainly for Ben, Brendon, myself and the ECB. I don't want to speculate on any of that until I, and we, have had a proper think, and we see what happens in the next week or so."
A trio of former England captains have pleaded with the ECB to not sack Ben Stokes in the wake of an investigation into his involvement in boozy incident in a London nightclub.
Both Stokes and fast bowler Gus Atkinson have been stood down for the second Test against New Zealand next week, with Joe Root – not vice-captain Harry Brook – to take the reins as skipper.
The incident immediately drew comparisons to that of Brook’s own last year, in which he was punched by a bouncer outside a nightclub in Wellington on the eve of a one-day match.
"Yes, Ben Stokes broke a curfew. Yes, he made a mistake. But is that a sacking offence as England’s Test captain? I don’t think so," Michael Vaughan wrote in his column for The Telegraph.
"The ECB has to be brave enough and strong enough to do what it thinks is right. If that is to sack him then fine, but I do not agree with that decision on this issue."
Also on Sky Sports Cricket, Nasser Hussain said Stokes would: "feel like he’s let them down" and would be feeling "a little bit embarrassed" by the incident.
He and Mike Atherton both agreed Father Time might also be starting to come for Stokes.
"The captains prior to Stokes in recent times, four years has been about the limit. And I think no matter who you are, it’s a job that takes its toll," Atherton said.
"I did have a kind of instinct before (the first Test against New Zealand) he was just looking like a man who’d been in the job four years."
"While I don't think it's a resignation or a sacking offence at all, for Ben Stokes, the key thing is his kind of state of mind four years into the job. That's been part of the conversation, no doubt, over the last two or three days."
It's not the first time Stokes has found himself in trouble for off-field incidents.
In 2017, he was involved in a fracas outside a nightclub in Bristol that led to a criminal trial, at which he was later found not guilty of affray. He missed the 2017-18 Ashes tour before being cleared the following summer.
The latest episode marks another setback for England, who faced intense scrutiny about their discipline after the 4-1 Ashes defeat by Australia.
To make matters worse, Stokes' form with the bat has been poorand his bowling workload has been significantly reduced by injury niggles. In the first Test, Stokes made 12 and a duck. He bowled just seven overs for the match, with figures of 1-34. He scored just 184 runs in the Ashes.
"He did look tired, haggard, whatever the phrase is before a ball went down this summer, and I saw a man (wearing) the toll of four years of captaincy," Hussain said.
"(Being England captain) weighs you down, and then on top of that, you add the form going, (and) nothing hits you harder as a cricketer than losing your form."
"Ben Stokes has been there for England a lot. He's been there as a captain, he's been there as a player at their finest moments, 50-over World Cups, T20 World Cups. He's been a warrior for England."
"He got it wrong this time. He got it horribly wrong, but I don't think that is a sackable offence."
"Ben will be in a dark place at the moment and I just hope Ben doesn't think that 'I've let so many people down that I'm going to retire."
Root is England’s longest-serving captain, having done so for 64 Tests between 2017-2022. He handed the reins to Stokes after the disastrous 2021-2022 Ashes.
The ECB described the second Test situation as "interim." The BBC reported Stokes is likely to miss the rest of the New Zealand series; before returning for the England’s second Test series of the summer against Pakistan.
Williamson can be proud of what he's accomplished. It can be difficult to play for that many years. I believe that it will take some time to surpass the number of runs he's scored. He'll surely be missed.
Stokes has to be disciplined. It's quite clear that he's a repeat offender. Those types of people will continue to behave in that manner. I believe it is an embarrassment. A country shouldn't be led by someone like this.