Mitchell Johnson contemplating retirement from T20s to be able to play in Ashes 2015

Mitchell Johnson is considering retiring from limited overs cricket to prolong his Test career

After having spearheaded his side to an Ashes whitewash of England in Australia, Mitchell Johnson is determined to have yet another crack at the urn in England in 2015 and is seriously considering quitting one of the limited overs format in an attempt to prolong his career.

Johnson is looking to quit the T20 format first as he still harbours hopes of leading Australia’s pace attack at the ODI World Cup in 2015 which will be played in Australia and New Zealand.

“I think I’ve got to be a lot smarter now. Twenty20, I will quite happily say, is not my favourite format – I would rather play Test cricket,” Johnson told cricket.com.au. “And maybe one-day cricket I have to look at as well.

“But my main goal now is to get to that 2015 Ashes series in England, so I’ll be doing everything I can to reach that goal.”

Johnson’s fiery spells with the new ball and the old one have led Australia to a 5-0 Ashes win and a 2-1 away series win against South Africa who are the No.1 test side in the world. Johnson was named Man of the Series in the Ashes and won the Allan Border medal for 2013 thanks to his remarkable performances in all formats of the game.

Johnson is back to playing T20 cricket in the Indian Premier League with his new franchise Kings XI Punjab and also said that he was keen on playing the World T20 before a toe injury kept him out.

“Twenty20 cricket you don’t play a lot of anyway, it just happened at this time there was a World Cup straight after the South Africa series which I was looking forward to being involved in before I got injured,” Johnson said.

The Queenslander also expressed his desire to contribute actively to a World Cup winning squad after he largely watched on from the bench during Australia’s World Cup triumph in 2007.

“I’d like to win a World Cup. I’ve been involved in the West Indies in 2007 which was a well-paid holiday apparently,” he said. “And while it was tough work, the campaign we went through, it was a good place to be and a great experience.

“So I would love to be a part of Australia’s 2015 World Cup and I certainly think we’ve got the team to win it. We’ve played some really good one-day cricket and given that it’s being played at home, it would be a great opportunity.”

Johnson bagged 24 wickets for the Mumbai Indians in last season’s IPL which was sort of the beginning of his renaissance and the left-armer is looking forward to the tournament yet again.

“I’ve had confidence with the white ball and been pretty consistent in the limited-overs format,” Johnson said. “You can get the white ball to swing, but really it’s just good to get out there and enjoy some cricket which is how I see the IPL – it’s really just a form of entertainment.”