The New Age Indian Cricketer
An impressive 34 off 28 balls that gave much needed
support to the Indian batting which crashed Australians in the quarter-final match
making way for India to the semi-final of the ICC World Cup
2011. Suresh Raina did his job perfectly and strengthened his position
in the Indian international cricket team.
In the words of Sharda Ugra of ESPN Cricinfo – ‘Suresh Raina represents the new
age Indian cricketer. An attacking left-hander who goes for the big shots with impunity
and clears the field with a swashbuckling flourish when at the top of his game,
Raina is also equally capable of attracting applause as an electric fielder in the
circle.’ Raina’s game yesterday stood testimony to this!
Suresh Raina is the youngest in a Kashmiri Pandit family of five children. Born
on November 27, 1986 in Muradnagar, Ghaziabad,
he decided to take up cricket seriously in 1999 and moved from Ghaziabad to Lucknow
to attend the specialist government Sports College. He rose to become the captain
of the Uttar Pradesh Under 16 cricket team. At the age of 15, he got selected for
the Under 19 cricket team’s tour to England, where he made a pair of half centuries
in the test matches. He toured Sri Lanka later that year with the Under 17 team.
He made his Ranji Trophy debut for Uttar Pradesh against Assam in February 2003
at the age of 16. In late 2003, he toured Pakistan for the Under 19 Asian ODI Championship
before being selected for the 2004 Under 19 World Cup, where he scored three half
centuries, including a 90 scored off only 38 balls. He was then awarded a Border-Gavaskar
scholarship to train at the Australian Cricket Academy. He was selected to participate
in the Challenger Series in early 2005 and after injury to Sachin Tendulkar and suspension of captain Sourav Ganguly,
Raina was selected for the Indian Oil Cup 2005 in Sri Lanka.
After some initial hiccups in finding his place in the Indian team, Raina got a
chance to become a member of the Indian middle order during the 2006 tour of Pakistan.
He was only required to bat in one match, in which he helped guide the latter part
of the successful run chase in the fourth ODI. Upon his return to India, he was
called up to the test squad, but he did not play in the test series against England.
He earned his first man of the match award in the subsequent ODI series after scoring
an unbeaten 81 in a successful run chase at Faridabad.
On 25 June 2008, he scored his maiden hundred against Hong Kong during the 2008
Asia Cup. His 66 balls hundred was, the second fastest century in Indian ODI history
at the time. He scored 84 off 69 against Pakistan and 116 off 107 against Bangladesh,
in next two matches. Since then, Raina has been a member of India's full strength
ODI and T20 team.
In January 2010, Raina scored 106 from 115 balls in the final of the triangular
ODI tournament against Sri Lanka in Bangladesh. His innings took India to 245 after
they collapsed to be 5/60, but it was not enough to save the match. Raina was the
third highest run scorer in the 2010 Indian Premier League and was man of the match
in the final, top-scoring with 55 not out from 35 balls. With his 101 from 60 balls
with five sixes and nine fours in the 2010 ICC World Twenty20 against South Africa
on 2 May 2010, he became the third player to score a Twenty20 international century.
Suresh Raina is steady on his way to becoming a seasoned performer. And it can be
safely said that even after some terrific innings, this young gun of Indian cricket
is yet to show us the best of the shots!
