Robin Uthappa has announced his retirement from both Indian and international cricket. Uthappa is now free to accept contracts in international T20 competitions and “charting a new phase in my life” after receiving a no-objection Certificate (NOC) from Kerala, the last state he represented in domestic cricket.

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Uthappa, a member of India’s Under-19 World Cup team from 2004, made his international debut in 2006, played in 46 One-Day Internationals (ODIs) and 13 Twenty20 Internationals (T20Is), and was a member of the side that won the first T20 World Cup in South Africa in 2007.

He also won multiple domestic championships with Karnataka and twice won the IPL, with the Chennai Super Kings in 2021 and the Kolkata Knight Riders in 2014, respectively.

Uthappa, who is now 36, began his domestic career in 2002-03 with Karnataka and finished it in the shortened 2020-21 season with Kerala. He additionally played for Saurashtra in the 2017–18 and 2018–19 campaigns.

In 142 first-class games, he scored 9446 runs with 22 centuries while averaging nearly 41, and in 203 one-day games, he added another 6534 runs with 16 hundreds while averaging 35.31. He scored 7272 runs and averaged 133.08 in 291 T20 games, the last of which he participated for Super Kings in the 2022 IPL.

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The Super Kings, Knight Riders, Mumbai Indians, Pune Warriors India, Royal Challengers Bangalore, and Rajasthan Royals were the teams he played for during the IPL’s 15 seasons. In 205 IPL games, he scored 4952 runs, batting at a 130.35 strike rate and average 27.51.

Uthappa was sacked shortly after the 2007 T20 World Cup due to poor play. He gained worldwide recognition in 2006 with to his aggressive batting style. He completed a rare treble with Karnataka, who won the Ranji Trophy, the Irani Cup, and the Vijay Hazare Trophy in the 2013–14 season, the year before he played his final few games for India.

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He then had a successful IPL season for Knight Riders in 2014, finishing the campaign as the competition’s top run-scorer with a total of 660 runs at a strike rate of 138.

He was granted a return to the Indian team for tours of Zimbabwe and Bangladesh in 2014 and 2015, but the meagre revenues forced him to leave once more. In the interim, he led the Ranji Trophy run chart as Karnataka became the first home team to repeat its championship trifecta in 2014–15.