Nat Sciver’s exit should tell women’s cricket it has some thinking to do

It’s fine to be sad. It’s fine to cry, even if it seems a little silly because, after all, it’s not like you knew her personally. It’s fine to feel bereft, disorientated, to sense the floor subsiding just a little.

Equally, it’s fine to feel nothing at all, perhaps even wonder what all the fuss is about. Though she meant different things to all of us, her loss will touch us all. And with any luck, she’ll be back for the tour of West Indies in December.

Thursday morning dawned just like any other. Of course there had been vague rumblings throughout the summer that something wasn’t quite right: public engagements scaled back, responsibilities delegated, the captaincy of the Trent Rockets passed on. Perhaps we should have recognised the red flags sooner. And yet when the news broke shortly before 7pm there was still that palpable sense of shock and bewilderment. One moment she was there. The next she was gone.

The precise circumstances of Nat Sciver’s sudden decision to take a break from cricket before this month’s India white-ball series will and should remain private. And yet it feels an appropriate moment to discuss and reflect on the legacy of this extraordinary woman who achieved so much, who came from a privileged upbringing but still had to brave many tempests during the course of her journey, who offer us nothing but hard work and a sense of duty, and yet who over time came to be seen not just as a versatile middle-order batter and handy purveyor of cutters and cross-seamers, but as a friend.

Sciver is just 30 years old but has already played enough cricket to last a lifetime. And if she walked away from the sport tomorrow her body of work would still stand the test of time: World Cup and Ashes wins, one of the