Odd lung condition spurs Hastings' indefinite break from cricket

John Hastings, the Australian fast bowler, is suffering from a lung condition that has put a brake on his career. The doctors have done numerous tests and are yet to figure out what the problem is - a discomfort that he feels only when bowling.

The 32-year-old announced his retirement from Tests and One-Day Internationals (ODIs) in October 2017 to focus solely on Twenty20 (T20) cricket. Having led Big Bash League franchise Melbourne Stars in the previous edition, Hastings was supposed to play for Sydney Sixers in the 2018-19 season.

"It's something that, over probably the last three or four months, has been a really difficult period for me," Hastings told Australian radio station RSN on Friday (October 12). "It's basically every time I've been trying to gear up and get ready to bowl, I've been coughing up blood.

"What's happened is basically I won't be able to bowl this year or probably moving forward unless this sort of situation gets sorted out. It's just something that they can't say, 'look, you're not going to have a fatal bleed on the field' or it's not going to cause long-term damage.

"It's pretty shattering. I've come to terms with it now, but over the last four or five months it's been a very, very tough period. I've played this game my whole life and I wanted to keep playing it. I wanted to play tournaments all around the world. That's one of the reasons I retired early from one-day and four-day cricket."

The first occurrence Hastings faced was two years ago and at that time it was not as aggravated as it is now. He used to cough up blood once in a while unlike in the recent times when he spits out blood whenever he bowls.

"Every time I'm bowling now, it's happening," he said. "It's literally just bowling. It's not running. I can do boxing weight sessions, rowing, anything like that, but as soon as the pressure [of bowling] at the crease at match intensity, when I step it up, literally I burst blood vessels in my lungs and I walk back to my mark and cough up some blood.

"So it's pretty scary, but they can't tell for sure it's not going to cause long-term damage. There's a lot of grey area surrounding it. It's not a very nice thing to have happened at the moment."