Graeme Cremer turns 40 between the second and third ODIs, and his last one was in March 2018

Graeme Cremer turns 40 on Saturday, in the gap between Zimbabwe’s second and third one-day internationals against Australia. The last time he played an ODI, the opponents were the United Arab Emirates and the date was 22 March 2018.

Zimbabwe named him in their 15-man squad on 13 September alongside Brendan Taylor, who is also 40. Sikandar Raza, the T20I captain, takes charge in place of Richard Ngarava, and the three matches are at the Harare Sports Club on 15, 18 and 20 September.

Eight and a half years, and a job in Dubai

Cremer captained Zimbabwe from May 2016 until March 2018, and Zimbabwe Cricket sacked him after the side failed to get out of the 2018 World Cup Qualifier. Zimbabwe hosted that tournament. Missing the 2019 World Cup from your own grounds is the sort of failure that ends a captaincy, and it ended his international career too.

He had 96 ODIs behind him by then, with 119 wickets at 30.22 and a best of 6 for 46. He stopped playing professionally after December 2018, and in January 2019 the family moved to Dubai when his wife took a job flying for Emirates. He coached instead: a spell as a consultant with the UAE team, work at the Rajasthan Royals Academy, then running the girls’ development programme at an academy in Dubai. That is a career, and it is not a cricketer’s career.

He came back to Zimbabwe during the school holidays in 2025 and started playing club cricket again for Takashinga. In November he took 9 for 144 for Mid West Rhinos in the Logan Cup, his first first-class match since December 2017 and the best innings return of his life. He was back in the international side later that year for Zimbabwe’s T20 World Cup qualifying campaign, played at the tournament itself in February 2026 and had Pathum Nissanka caught, then missed time with an arm injury before returning in Namibia in August.

The ODI recall is the last part of the set. Whether he bowls at Harare is a separate question. That he is in the squad at all is the story.

Taylor, the ban, and the phone call that changed his mind

Taylor’s absence had nothing to do with form. He retired in September 2021. Four months later he described publicly how corruptors had tried to trap him in 2019, offering him cocaine and then using it to blackmail him. He never fixed a match. He did delay reporting the approach to the ICC, which he said was out of fear for his family, and that delay is what the anti-corruption code punishes. The ICC banned him from all cricket for three and a half years in January 2022. He went through a 12-step programme and rehab in the years that followed.

The ban expired in late July 2025. He was back in the Test side by August, played his most recent Test against Bangladesh in Harare in June this year, and last appeared in an ODI against Sri Lanka at the same ground on 31 August 2025.

His one-day record is the second-best any Zimbabwean has managed: 207 matches, 6,704 runs at 35.28 and 11 hundreds, behind only Andy Flower. At 39 he was seriously considering a move into coaching, until Givemore Makoni, Zimbabwe Cricket’s managing director, talked him into playing on with the 2027 World Cup in mind. He will keep wicket in Harare in rotation with Tadiwanashe Marumani, and Clive Madande drops out to make room.

Zimbabwe are short, and it shows

Some of this is arithmetic rather than sentiment. Ngarava missed the Namibia tri-series with a lower-back problem and may be out well beyond this series, with a tri-series in the UAE and two Tests against Afghanistan still to come before the year ends. Tanaka Chivanga is unavailable with an Achilles concern. Blessing Muzarabani leads an attack filled out by Brad Evans and Newman Nyamhuri.

With the bat, Zimbabwe have leaned heavily on Brian Bennett, which is a lot of weight for one young player to carry. Taylor and Craig Ervine in the middle order are there to take some of it off him.

Australia have not been here since 2014

This is the first time Australia have toured Zimbabwe in 12 years, and the first ODI meeting between the sides since Zimbabwe travelled to Australia in 2022. The most recent meeting of any kind went Zimbabwe’s way: they beat Australia at the T20 World Cup in February on the way to the Super Eight and automatic qualification for the 2028 edition.

Mitchell Marsh captains an Australian squad that includes Travis Head, Cameron Green, Josh Hazlewood, Alex Carey, Josh Inglis and Adam Zampa. Zimbabwe will need the morning conditions and a good deal else besides.

The 2027 arithmetic

Zimbabwe co-host the next ODI World Cup with South Africa and Namibia, from 4 October to 21 November 2027. As Full Members they are already qualified, and Harare, Bulawayo and Victoria Falls will stage matches. After two decades in which Zimbabwe’s World Cup story was usually a qualifier they did not survive, the tournament is coming to them regardless of results.

Both Taylor and Cremer will be 41 by the time it starts, and Makoni’s pitch to Taylor was explicitly about that tournament. You can read it two ways. Either Zimbabwe believe a 41-year-old wicketkeeper with 6,704 ODI runs is still one of their best options in October 2027, or they have not produced enough players to make that question redundant. On the evidence of a squad that needed a leg-spinner out of a Dubai coaching job, it is closer to the second.

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