Cowan puts family before future

Three weeks ago, former and aspiring Australia opener Ed Cowan signed a new deal that would extend his career with Tasmania for a further season as he looked to push his claims for a recall to the Test team.

Today he revealed that while his desire to add to the 18 Test matches he’s played still burns, it is likely he will be playing grade cricket for Sydney University next summer after announcing he had changed his mind and his days as a Tasmanian cricketer were over.

Cowan told his coach Dan Marsh and his Tasmania Tigers teammates in the wake of their Bupa Sheffield Shield loss to new South Wales that he had changed his mind about next summer and would, instead, be returning with his wife and daughter to live in his former home town of Sydney.

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Cowan on the drive this summer // Getty Images

As he struggled to hold back tears in a media conference at Blundstone Arena this morning, Cowan admitted he realised within a day of signing the contract extension that he had made an error and that family should be his priority ahead of personal cricket aspirations.

While not formally drawing the curtain on hopes that he might earn a first-class recall with New South Wales, the 32-year-old conceded that the Blues was spoiled for alternative top-order batting options and that his cricket career might now be played out at club level.

“That was probably the catalyst to be fair, signing that,” Cowan said when asked what had changed in the days between committing to the Tigers for next summer and today’s announcement that he would be leaving the team and returning to the mainland after more than five years in Hobart.

“I made a mistake in signing it, but I didn’t realise it was a mistake until I did (sign it),” he said.

“It was that point in time that I re-evaluated my priorities in life and it was literally the next day that I thought “this is me, again, prioritising cricket over my family’ and that didn’t sit comfortably.

“I’ve had a bit of a tough three weeks with very little sleep.

“It’s affected my cricket which is disappointing because I really wanted to finish strongly, and I worked through ways that I could make next year work – I really wanted it to work for the team, to work for myself, to work for my family.

“But at the end of the day it was going to compromise my teammates because I would be backwards and forwards because my family was going to live in Sydney.

“It was going to compromise my team and compromise my own cricket preparation which isn’t fair but most importantly it was going to compromise my family.

“I feel very guilty that I signed it and I can’t honour it because you are only as good as your word, but I am also glad that it sped things up so that Tassie can look to the future, give someone else a game in this last fixture  if they choose and they can recruit for next season.” 

Cowan scores his maiden Test ton

Cowan, who made his Test debut at the MCG on Boxing Day against India in 2011 and his most recent against England in the first game of the 2013 Ashes series in the UK, played 21 Shield games for New South Wales between 2004 and 2009 before moving to Tasmania to push his international claims.

“We’ll move back (to Sydney), I haven’t spoken to New South Wales, I don’t know what their intention is,” he said.

“They’ve got a very strong squad.

“I don’t really know and it hasn’t really been a priority because it’s been a pretty tumultuous process to get to the clarity around my thought process.

“It’s a hard place because I still desire to play Test cricket but there’s a realisation that might have gone and it’s family first from here.

“I might end up playing club cricket for Sydney Uni next year and that’s the only cricket I play.”

Part of the reason for the shift to Hobart in 2009 was that he found himself battling with other Test aspirants in the NSW line-up including the late Phillip Hughes, who himself moved from Sydney to Adelaide to re-ignite his Test aspirations.

Cowan was one of so many former teammates and friends who were deeply affected by Hughes’s death last November, and he indicated today that it was the passing of his good friend that has changed the context in which cricket is viewed against other elements of life.

“Without a doubt, it’s not something you can dwell on too much but it’s given everyone perspective,” Cowan said of Hughes’s death.

“It’s a game to be enjoyed and loved and at the end of the day it’s still a game whether you win, lose or draw.

“It’s not to say that anyone has been less competitive about their cricket (since he died) but I think priorities have probably shifted around for more guys than you can probably realise.” 

Cowan had recently spoken in detail about the changes he had made to his batting to try and heighten his appeal to the national selectors, and had revealed he was targeting one of the additional batting berths in the squad that will tour the UK for the Ashes later this year.

While claiming he has not given away his hopes of playing Test cricket once again, he claimed he had come to the realisation that it was less than more likely and he had to make decisions about his post-cricket life accordingly.

“It was hard to take when other guys got selected (ahead of him recently) but I think I’m old enough to understand that you don’t waste energy on other people’s journeys,” Cowan said today.

“It’s just a bit of a personal assessment, the conversations I’ve had in recent months with the national (selection) panel have been really positive.

“The desire is still there but the priority has to be with my family, and if that means I never play (top-level cricket) again then I’m happy with that and I accept it.

“I’m disappointed to not get a last game at Bellerive as a Tasmanian player, my last game at Bellerive now is the glorious figures of a pair (against Queensland last month) which is not a nice way to leave.

“But it’s very hard to write fairytales in life, let alone in sport.”