Callum Ferguson

Callum James Ferguson (born 21 November 1984) is a former Australian cricketer and commentator who has represented Australia in all three forms of international cricket.

He also represented South Australia in the JLT One-Day Cup.

In 2003 he was awarded a scholarship to the Australian Cricket Academy.

Ferguson played his first game for South Australia in their final game of the 2002–03 ING Cup, Australia's domestic one-day tournament, on 16 February 2003.

He came in at number 9 and scored 3 runs.

After captaining South Australia in the 2003 Commonwealth Bank Under-19 Championship Series, Ferguson was selected to in Australia's squad for the 2004 Under-19 Cricket World Cup.

He played three matches in the 2003–04 ING Cup, scoring a half-century against Victoria.

During a warmup match two days before Australia's first match in the World Cup he faced the first knee injury of his career, leaving him unable to play any matches in the World Cup.

Ferguson began his domestic career in the 2004–05 season, and by 2009 his form in limited overs cricket was good enough for him to be selected by the Australian national cricket team.

Ferguson made his first-class debut for South Australia on 16 October 2004 against Victoria at South Australia's home ground, the Adelaide Oval, with scores of 2 and 46.

In just his second match, he top-scored for South Australia with 93 in the second innings against Queensland, almost taking the Redbacks to an unlikely victory.

Ferguson scored a duck in a disastrous yet memorable innings for South Australia in which they were dismantled for a record low total of 29, mainly due to a devastating spell of 7/4 from Australian representative Nathan Bracken.

He scored his maiden first-class century in the second innings of the match with a score of 103.

He had a very strong debut season overall, top scoring for Redbacks with 733 runs at an average of 38.57 runs per wicket.

He also scored 225 at an average of 28.12 in the one-day ING Cup.

Ferguson's second season also saw him produce solid results, as he scored 506 first-class runs at an average of 36.14 and was one of 15 players to be selected for the Australian Cricket Academy.

He was less successful in one-day matches, only scoring 175 runs at an average of 21.87.

Ferguson started his cricket with the Prospect District Cricket Club before moving to the West Torrens Cricket Club in the 2005/06 season.

He has since become captain of West Torrens DCC and had the Ferguson-George Cricket Academy for promising young players in the West Torrens zone named after him and Southern Redbacks teammate and fellow Australian Cricket Representative Peter George.

He fell into poor form in the 2006–07 season, averaging under 30 in both first-class and one-day matches.

This resulted in him being dropped from the South Australian side in December before being recalled in late February, when he scored a match-winning half century in a one-day match against Tasmania.

Ferguson's first opportunity of the 2007–08 season came in a Pura Cup match against New South Wales where he managed a first-innings score of 83, showing particular skill with the drive shot, and a second-innings score of 59.

He scored his third first-class fifty in a row in Darren Lehmann's farewell match against Western Australia.

For the 2008 winter, Ferguson went to northern England to play for Netherfield Cricket Club after being told by his state coaches that he needed to convert his starts into larger scores more often.

During his time at the club he managed to score 1381 runs at an average of 106, including six fifties and six centuries.

In the early part of Ferguson's career he had been known for regularly failing to build on solid starts to his innings, but the 2008–09 season proved to be a breakout season for him.

In a breakout performance against Western Australia he finally scored his maiden List A century with an 83-ball 101.

Though his form in ODIs was strong, bolstering Australia's middle order, a knee injury in the 2009 ICC Champions Trophy final took him out of competitive cricket for 11 months and he lost his place in the national side.

When the Big Bash League was created he initially played for the Adelaide Strikers, but played for the Melbourne Renegades for three seasons after moving in the 2014–15 season and now plays for the Sydney Thunder.

He also spent two seasons playing for Pune Warriors India in the Indian Premier League.

He has played few ODIs since, and he played a single Test match in 2016 against South Africa, scoring 4 runs across his two innings.

Ferguson has played for South Australia for his entire domestic career, which spanned over fourteen seasons.

In the 2019 BBL he scored 113*, the top score in BBL 2019.

He was formerly the captain of the Sydney Thunder in the Big Bash League before being released at the end of the 2020–21 season

During the 2020-21 Sheffield shield season Ferguson announced he was retiring from first class cricket.

He said “Once I got left out of the first game of the year, it knocked a bit of the wind out of my sails”.

He conceded that being dropped sped up his retirement.

On the 7th of February 2021, Ferguson was notified that he would not be offered a contract for the 2021-22 Big Bash season despite captaining the franchise for the last 2 seasons.

Following his retirement from cricket, Ferguson works as a commentator for Triple M, Seven and Nine Australia.

Ferguson attended Blackfriars Priory School in Prospect, South Australia before moving to Marryatville High School in Year 9, where he completed his schooling.