Yesterday, Monday 14th August 2023, Steven Finn announced his retirement from all forms of cricket with immediate effect.
The right-arm seamer, born in Watford on 4th April 1989, played a total of 261 matches for Middlesex in all forms of the game in a career which spanned seventeen years, between 2005 and 2021.
Finn came to Middlesex's attention as a youngster, joining the Middlesex Academy having learned the game at his Club side Langleybury Cricket Club and then West Herts Cricket Club.
Whilst graduating through Middlesex's Academy, Finn had already been singled out as a special talent by the England Schools' Cricket Association, playing three times for ESCA in 2004, alongside his Academy teammates Billy Godleman and Dan Housego, and the likes of Sam Northeast, Alex Blake, Alex Wakely, Tom Westley, Ben Brown, Stuart Meaker and Will Beer, who like Finn, all went on to play the game professionally.
2005 was a breakthrough year for Finn, who not only made his maiden appearances in both the Second Eleven Championship and the Second Eleven Trophy for Middlesex, making nine appearances that year, but he also became the Club's youngest ever debutant in First-Class cricket, when appearing for the Club against Cambridge University Centre of Cricketing Excellence at Fenners Cricket Ground in June 2005, aged just 16, picking up two wickets on his professional debut.
Finn's development continued with the Club's Second Eleven over the next two years, playing regularly and making 21 appearances across both Second Eleven formats throughout 2006 and 2007, and having made his professional debut over two years earlier, he was again given the opportunity to make an impression in the First Eleven in the Club's NatWest Pro40 campaign, playing four times in the group stages and once in the play-off match against Northamptonshire at the Walker Ground in Southgate, when his 3 for 30 earned him the Man of the Match award in front of the Sky cameras.
Finn had shown enough to the Club's selectors to now be pushing hard for a regular spot in the First Eleven, and late in 2007 he played in the Club's final three County Championship matches of the season, picking up eleven wickets, including two four wicket hauls, 4 for 51 against Gloucestershire at Bristol, and 4 for 61 against Essex at Chelmsford.
Finn was also on the radar of the England selectors, and between 2006 and 2008 was playing in the England Performance Programme and was a regular fixture in England's Under 19 side, playing numerous ODI's and Test matches for the young England side, and in the Under 19 World Cup held in Malaysia in 2008.
Across 2008 and 2009 Finn was now being seen as a regular in Middlesex's Championship First-Eleven side, missing just one match over the two seasons, and taking 81 wickets, whilst also featuring for Middlesex in both List-A and T20 formats, taking 31 wickets in the two white-ball competitions. He played a big part in Middlesex lifting the T20 trophy for the one and only time in the Club's history, making five appearances for the Club on our route to Finals Day at the Rose Bowl.
2009 proved to be a defining season for a still young Finn, now aged only 20, as having played in all of Middlesex's Championship match over the summer, and having taken 53 wickets at an average of just over 30, at the end of the year Finn was called up for the England Lions winter tour against Pakistan, played in Abu Dhabi in early 2010.
This then led to call-up to the England Test squad, initially as bowling cover for their winter tour to Bangladesh in March, although Finn's performance in a warm-up fixture ahead of the first Test saw him selected to play, ahead of Liam Plunkett and Ajmal Shazhad, making his Test debut for England against Bangladesh at the Zohur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium in Chittagong on 12th March 2010. He followed this up with selection for the Second Test in Mirpur, and finished the two Test series with the first four Test wickets of his career in the bank.
Back on home soil, Finn started the 2010 domestic season for Middlesex in blistering form, picking up career best bowling figures in the opening fixture of the County Championship season. His 9 for 37, against Worcestershire at New Road, were at the time the seventh best First-Class innings bowling figures ever recorded by a Middlesex bowler, and his 14 for 106 in the match were the fifteenth best match bowling figures in the Club's history.
After picking up 29 wickets for Middlesex in the first five games of the season, Finn was again named in the England Test squad for the two home summer series against Bangladesh and Pakistan in 2010, and played an integral role in helping England to a 2-0 series win against Bangladesh, taking five wicket hauls at both Lord's and Old Trafford, to earn him the player of the series award. Finn then played in all four Tests against Pakistan, picking up 13 wickets in the series. In 2011 Finn became the youngest ever player to take fifty Test wickets for England, and between 2010 and 2017 Finn made a total of 36 Test appearances for England, in which he took 125 wickets at an average 30.40.
He also became a regular in England's white-ball sides, between 2010 and 2017, playing 69 One Day Internationals and 21 International T20s for England, including appearing playing in the ICC World Cups, the ICC World T20, and the ICC Champions Trophy competitions. In total he picked up 129 wickets for his country across both white-ball formats.
For Middlesex, Finn played an integral role in Middlesex's promotion from Division Two of the County Championship in 2011, playing in seven of the Club's matches in the campaign and picking up 31 wickets at just 21.32.
Again, in 2016, when Middlesex secured the County Championship trophy for the first time since 1993, which concluded in that incredible season finale against Yorkshire at Lord's, Finn played a huge part in Middlesex's successful campaign, playing in eight matches, picking up 31 wickets at 29.41.
Throughout his time at Middlesex, Finn was picked up by a number of other sides to play in competitions around the globe, featuring for Otago in New Zealand in 2011 in the Plunkett Shield, for Islamabad United in the Pakistan Super League in 2017, and for Manchester Originals in the inaugural year of the Hundred in 2021.
In his seventeen years at Middlesex, Finn made a total of 261 appearances for the Club, with Middlesex career his stats as follows:
First-Class : 109 matches - 394 wickets at 28.13 - Best bowling of 9 for 37
List-A : 59 matches - 77 wickets at 28.14 - Best bowling of 5 for 33
T20 : 93 matches - 116 wickets at 22.25 - Best bowling of 5 for 16
At the end of the 2021 season, Finn was released by the Club, and joined Sussex ahead of the start of the 2022 season, where he played until announcing his retirement from the game yesterday.
The 6 foot 7 inch giant paceman was a fantastic servant to Middlesex Cricket. The first Academy graduate to play First-Class cricket for the Club and go on to represent his country. One of the nicest and most popular characters in the dressing room, and someone that has had a long-lasting impression on all those who have had the fortune to play with him or meet him.
Everyone at Middlesex Cricket would like to wish Finny every success in the future, which looks destined to be behind the microphone with the Test Match Special team on BBC Radio. Whatever else comes next Finny, we wish you all the luck in the world and thanks for the memories.
