Player Diary: Fi Morris discusses retirement and reflects on her career
Read Fi Morris' final Player Diary for Lancashire
The four years I’ve had at Lancashire has, 100 percent, been the best period of my career.
It’s a special club. It feels like a family whenever you walk into Emirates Old Trafford, and it’s something I will definitely miss now that I’ve retired.
There’s some special people there, and I’ve made a lot of friends.
To go what I went through in terms of losing my contract at Western Storm and then to come up to Lancashire and almost have a second wind in my career, it’s been pretty amazing.
I’m really honoured to have been able to end my career wearing the Lancashire shirt.
To go out against Yorkshire at Headingley on Saturday with one of my great pals in Kate Cross was pretty cool. But it was definitely an emotional day.
It’s obviously a shame we couldn’t have ended it with a trophy. But, had we started this competition in June, I think we’d have been at the top of the table. We’ve had six wins out of eight in the second half, which was an unbelievable effort from the team. It shows how much character we've got in the dressing room.
We had that tight loss against Somerset which meant we couldn’t get through, but to run it close after the start we had should give the girls a lot of confidence.
Performance wise, the last few weeks is up there as the best I’ve performed for Lancashire over the last couple of years, really.
I guess that’s maybe because the pressure has been taken off. All you want to do in the last few weeks of your career is enjoy it, and I feel like I’m at my best when I enjoy it.
My dream was to end my career still loving the game, and I still love the game.
There was nothing on the Yorkshire game, but it certainly didn’t feel like that. No Roses game is ever a dead rubber. They’d beaten us twice and we’d won one before that game, and we were absolutely determined to make sure it didn’t go 3-1.
It was really classy and lovely of Yorkshire to send us off the way they did, with a bunch of flowers for myself and Crossy. They were presented by Lauren Winfield-Hill, and her and Crossy are really good mates.
Obviously, winning the double last year was one of my highlights, while another one which springs to mind was the 5-7 I got playing for the Manchester Originals in The Hundred against Birmingham in 2023.
That was my first season with Lancashire and the Originals, and it almost felt like a ‘Well done for sticking in with your career’ moment.
I’ll be having a bit of a break now. I’m going to go on holiday to Australia and catch up with some family and friends who I haven’t seen over the summer.
After that, I’ll run my skincare business, KoSkn. But for now, a couple of months to decompress, process the emotions and do all the kind of things you can’t do when you’re a pro cricketer.
I’ve obviously spoken about the tough start to the season we had at Lancs on the back of the highs of last summer. But, again, these last few weeks have shown what a brilliant side we are.
There will be a bit of a rebuild with a few senior players leaving, but there’s some incredible talent coming through with the likes of Skye Thomas and Venus Weerappuli to name just a couple.
The Academy team has dominated over the last few years, and I’m sure they will make the step up.
I can’t wait to come down to Emirates Old Trafford and watch them play.
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