Biography of Saurav Ganguly
Kolkata skipper, Sourav Ganguly has recently made headlines for his return to the Indian cricket team in the ODI and Test formats. The captain of the Indian cricket team was born on July 8, 1972 in West Bengal. He captained the one-day cricket team from 2000 to 2005 where he made his international debut against Australia in 1992 and his Test debut against England in 1996.
Nicknamed the Bengal Tiger, Sourav made history during India’s 1996 tour of England, scoring two centuries in the next two matches including his debut. His 183 against Sri Lanka at Taunton in the 1999 World Cup, is the highest score by an Indian in a World Cup.
Following a series of misconducts, he was expelled from the national team in October 2005. He returned to the national Test team in November 2006, following the poor run of the Indian team in South Africa. In January 2007, he returned to the Indian ODI team. Ganguly led India to the 2003 World Cup, where the Kangaroos defeated them. He has more than 10,000 runs in One Day Internationals and more than 5,000 runs in Test cricket to his name, along with Sachin Tendulkar, forming one of the best opening batsmen in modern cricket.
Sourav Ganguly: Early life and Education
Sourav Ganguly (48) was born on July 8, 1972 in Calcutta (now Kolkata), India to Chandidas and Nirupa Ganguly. His father was one of the richest men in the country and ran a successful printing business. After a long illness, his father died on February 21, 2013 at the age of 73.
Sourav Ganguly first played football as it was the favorite sport of the people of Kolkata but later he was attracted to cricket. However, his mother was not very supportive of him pursuing a career in sports.
Sourav Ganguly’s younger brother, Snehasish Ganguly, an established cricketer at the time, supported Ganguly’s dream of becoming a cricketer and convinced their father to enroll Ganguly in cricket training during his summer vacation. He was admitted to a cricket school where his shooting skills were discovered.
He learned cricket from his brother and although he is right-handed, he learned to bat with his left hand so that he could use his brother’s equipment. He made a hundred years against the 15th of Orissa to be the head of the Gricket team of St. Xavier.
In 1989, Bengalites selected. Unfortunately, his brother fell by the wayside that year. After a spectacular performance in the Ranji Trophy in the 1990-91 season, the southpaw came into the limelight.
Carrer of Ganguly
Domestic Carrer
Sourav rose through the ranks with his performance in school cricket. At the age of 18, he made his Ranji Trophy debut in the final between Bengal and Delhi at the Eden Gardens. As the game ended in a draw, Bengal were crowned champions.
International debut
Based on his performances in the domestic competition, he made his ODI debut in January 1992 against West Indies. He not only failed in his first outing, but also became famous for his rude behavior.
He was immediately kicked out of the national team and brought back to the local competition. He won big in the next two Ranji Trophy seasons. In the Duleep Trophy just before India’s tour of England, he scored a brilliant 171 and was again selected to play for India. He made his Test debut at Lord’s and had the highest score (131) by any batsman on his Lord’s debut. He scored another century in the first innings of his second Test and became only the third batsman to score a century in the first two innings of his career. Ganguly went on to score 1533 runs including 4850 and 3237 ODIs including 623 fifties from 1997 to 1999 World Cup. Captain rank
In the year 2000, Sourav Ganguly was named the captain of the ODI team. He led the team to their first win against South Africa. He also successfully led the team to the final of the 2000 ICC Knockout Trophy. Although the team did not win many trophies, they said that India can also fight abroad. Under Ganguly’s leadership, India broke Australia’s winning streak of 16 consecutive matches in 2001.
Another highlight of Sourav’s career came during the Natwest series where India beat England in an ODI at Lord’s and swooped off his shirt from the Lord’s balcony. It was in response to Andrew Flintoff waving his shirt at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai. He also called the team to the 2003 ICC World Cup final, but the Australians lost. Although his hitting has improved, his batting performance has declined. In 2005, he was expelled from the group. The bad luck continued in 2007 when Greg Chappell was appointed as the coach of the Indian team. Greg turned out to be a bad guy for India because he clashed with many senior players, Ganguly being one of them. Greg said that Sourav is mentally and physically unfit to lead the Indian team.
club work
The year 2008 was significant in terms of the popularity of Indian cricket. The Indian Premier League has launched and named the ‘Prince of Calcutta’ as the captain of the Kolkata Knight Riders, a franchise owned by Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan.
He played for KKR till 2010. In 2011, he was signed by former Pune Warriors India.
He played for them for two seasons and then retired from the IPL.
Records and Achievements
Sourav Ganguly is the only cricketer to win four consecutive Man of the Match awards in One Day Internationals.
He is the eighth highest scorer in ODIs and second among Indians, with 11,363 runs. He holds the record for the highest score by any batsman in an ICC Champions Trophy final (117).
Dada is also the first player to score three goals in ICC Champions Trophy history.
His Test batting average never fell below 40. Ganguly is the first batsman in the world to score a century on his debut and be returned the first ball in his final Test innings.
He is a Padma Shri laureate. Ganguly received the Banga Bhushan award from the West Bengal government in 2013.
