Nicola Carey has 'no regrets' for declining CA contract

Nicola Carey held a contract with Cricket Australia (CA) since 2018 but in April 2023, she declined a lucrative renewal offer as she wasn't getting consistent playing time with the 'Green and Gold'.

The all-rounder played just nine out of the 33 games that Australia played since the beginning of 2022, between the home Ashes and the home ODIs against Pakistan in January. Carey was left out of the T20 World Cup in South Africa earlier this year. The 30-year-old decided to turn down the CA contract and instead, signed a Cricket Tasmania contract and spent a full preseason at home in Hobart. Carey said that she had no regrets about her decision to skip the CA contract as she is getting consistent playing time in domestic cricket.

"I had some really good chats with (national selector Shawn Flegler) and I think that was really positive. Ultimately I'm really happy with my decision to stay at home and get that bulk training and play some consistent cricket and I've got no regrets there. I did have a good hard think about it and Flegs was great. He gave me some time to think about it as well, which I really appreciated," Carey told cricket.com.au.

"It's never an easy decision to make, I had a great few years in the Australian squad and they're going amazing at the minute. It's a really tough squad to get into and a really great group of girls as well ... so not an easy decision, but certainly one that I'm happy with. It was really nice to spend bulk time at home and work on a few different things - not major things, just working on a few different things with the ball and little things with the bat as well," she added.

Carey is currently playing in the Women's Big Bash League for the Hobart Hurricanes. They are placed at No. 5 on the points table and are trying to put in a last-ditch effort to make the WBBL finals. Carey has scored 165 runs in eight innings at a strike rate of 109 and taken 10 wickets at an average of 22 after missing a few games earlier in the tournament due to a quad injury.

"It's been really up and down sometimes (but) that's T20 for you though, isn't it? One game you'll get hit for 1000 and then one game you might not get hit for too many. So it's been a bit up and down, which makes sense and it reflects the team performances as well. There's lots of positives that we can take as a team and plenty to work on as well," Carey said.

Nicola Carey has not given much thought to Australia comeback

Carey noted that it is very difficult to break into the Australian side as they are very successful. She will turn her focus on the Women's National Cricket League (WNCL) after the WBBL ends. Carey's team, Tasmania will look to win a third consecutive WNCL title.

"I haven't really given (playing for Australia again) a lot of thought to be fair. When I made the decision it was all about playing more cricket. And understandably it's really hard to get into that team and get a game, because they've been ridiculously successful, which has been awesome for Australian cricket," Carey stated.

"But I'm playing consistent playing games ... which has been really nice, so I'm happy with where that's at. I'll get to play every game of WNCL which I really enjoy, I love getting back and playing with the Tigers girls, we've got a great bunch of girls and I'm really looking forward to playing a full season there," Carey concluded.