Career
Nathan has 16 ODI Centuries and 37 ODI Fifties to his name and is the second highest run-scorer of all time in One-Day Internationals for New Zealand. His highest ODI score of 145* was recorded against relative minnows USA although he won several matches for his country against countries with full Test match status. He has played County Cricket in England for Derbyshire, Durham and Nottinghamshire and plays for Canterbury in New Zealand.
On 31 May 2006, Lancashire announced that Astle would be a short-term overseas replacement for Australian International Brad Hodge in the month of July.
Astle is also an occasional partnership-breaking medium pace bowler and a competent fielder. Because of this multi-utility option he always enjoyed selection in the team but his laid-back attitude resulted him never been considered for the captaincy, despite his seniority.
He began at Canterbury as a no-account batsman and the most parsimonious of medium-paced bowlers; however his batting developed quickly. After becoming a free-scoring one-day player Astle was turned by the national coach Glenn Turner into a first-rate Test top-order batsman, with consecutive hundreds in West Indies in 1995-96. Astle passed Martin Crowe's record number of one-day hundreds for New Zealand (4) during the 1997–1998 summer. For his efforts, Astle received the Player of the Year award for the 1998 season. He was also named New Zealand's One-Day International Batsman of the Year.
Nathan Astle had the fifth highest batting average (49.6) against Australia in Test matches since 1990, compared to other players who have played 10+ tests. This compared to his test batting average of 37.02. He has also scored one test century against Australia. Astle scored sixteen One-Day International Centuries which is the most by any New Zealand batsman to date. He is currently 6th on the all-time list of One-Day centuries behind such names as Tendulkar, Ponting, and Ganguly.
During the 2005 Chappell–Hadlee Series and the preceding tour to South Africa Astle incurred media criticism, along with fellow New Zealand cricket team team-mates Craig McMillan, Hamish Marshall and James Marshall, for a slump in form.
In late 2005, Astle was dropped from the national team. He returned in 2006, for the home series against the West Indies. He returned to form, and was New Zealand's leading run scorer in the ODIs. After returning, Nathan received the 2005–2006 Walter Hadlee Trophy for Best New Zealand One-Day International batsman. Over the New Zealand summer, he scored 690 One-Day runs from eleven games at an average of 54.2 runs.
On 26 January 2007, Astle announced his retirement from International cricket in advance of the World Cup, stating at the press conference in Perth, "I have been fighting this day for about eight months. I so desperately wanted to go to my fourth World Cup, but deep down inside I knew that I was lacking motivation and the enjoyment levels were just not there." Nathan Astle played his last One-Day International on 23 January against England at the Adelaide Oval. In 2007 he played for Longton C.C in Staffordshire.
He was a part of the Mumbai Champs team in the inaugural 20/20 Tournament of the now defunct Indian Cricket League (ICL).
In 2009, Astle announced his intentions to make a career of coaching, and was appointed the head coach role of the Burnside West Christchurch University Cricket Club, a senior club in the Christchurch Metropolitan league, playing under the Canterbury Cricket Association.
Nathan Astle has also been a competent soccer player, playing for Rangers A.F.C. in Christchurch, a club which also at one time had fellow Black Cap Sir Richard Hadlee on its playing roster. Incredibly, Astle also took up Auto racing early in 2010, competing predominantly at Ruapuna Speedway in Christchurch, driving a Modified Sprint car.
Nathan Astle and Mike Atherton are having a trophy called the Astle–Atherton Trophy in the test matches against England starting from 2012-13.
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