Ryan Sidebottom to retire after 2017 County Championship season

Yorkshire fast bowler Ryan Sidebottom has announced he will retire from playing professional cricket at the end of the 2017 county season.

The 39-year-old, who helped England win the ICC World Twenty20 in 2010, will call time on a 20-year career spanning three decades in the summer.

Sidebottom will head into his final campaign with more than 1,000 career wickets to his name and five County Championship titles, after wins with Yorkshire in 2001, 2014 and 2015 and Nottinghamshire in 2005 and 2010.

Upon retirement he will focus on his cricket academies in York and Leeds, as well as helping under-privileged children in Yorkshire play the sport through his own foundation.

"There's a tear in my eye whenever I think about not playing professional cricket again - a game that's given me so much over the years But it's the right time and I want to go out on a high, rather than fade away as that's just not the sort of guy I am," said Sidebottom.