Indian cricketer VVS Laxman has formally announced his retirement with immediate effect from international cricket on Saturday. There had been intense speculation regarding the future of the Hyderabadi stylist after he managed a meagre 154 runs in eight innings during India's disastrous tour of Australia.

It is learnt that Laxman has been hurt by the constant criticism following his failure in the last two series and comments by critics that he should give way to youngsters. Laxman's tour of England was also dissappointing and calls for retirement reached crescendo after India's eight consecutive Test losses.

 
The 37-year-old batsman, who formed the core of India's famed middle-order that had Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly, ruled world cricket for more than a decade with his wristy stroke-making. It was the contribution of this famed quartet that helped India to gradually make progress in Test matches and get to the No 1 in the ICC Test rankings.

 
He scored 8781 runs with 17 Test centuries with highlight being the epic knock of 281 against Australia where India won the Test match after being made to follow on. He has a Test average of 45.97. Laxman was not a regular in India's ODI team and played 83 matches for 2338 runs with six centuries. The most disappointing aspect of his glorious career would be his failure of not playing in any of the four World Cup editions during his career span.