9 Jersey Number In Cricket: The numbers on cricketers’ shirts help identify a player to the officials, commentators, or even the spectators. The numbers on the front of a player’s shirt indicate the chronological position of their appearance for a particular country. Whereas, numbers on the back are typically self-chosen. However, these numbers are not always just useful for commentators or spectators alone. Sometimes, the jersey numbers of cricketers have much larger personal significance.
9 Jersey Number In Cricket
James Anderson
James Michael Anderson is an English international cricketer known for playing with Lancashire County Cricket Club and the England cricket team. He is also known as a part time cricket commentator at BBC. Among fast bowlers, Anderson is one of the leading wicket-takers of all-time at Test cricket level, as the first fast bowler to have taken 600 or more Test wickets, and is one of the highest wicket-takers overall. He also set the record for the most wickets taken by an England player in One-Day International (ODI) cricket. In June 2021 he made his 162nd appearance for England in Test cricket, becoming one of the England’s most capped players. He is regarded as one of the greatest bowlers in the history of cricket.
A right-arm fast swing bowler, Anderson made his international debut at the end of 2002 during England’s winter tour of Australia, then played his first Test match against Zimbabwe when the team toured England the following summer. His early career was held back by injuries, including a stress fracture of the back which kept him out of action for most of the 2006 season, but thereafter he established himself as the key opening bowler in the England Test team. He was a regular strike bowler with the national one-day side, but decided not to participate in the shorter format of the game at international level after the 2015 World Cup.
Anderson was the first English bowler to reach 400, 500 and 600 wickets in Test matches. He is ranked in the top of the ICC Test Bowling Rankings, having previously reached the first position at various times. In July 2021, in the 2021 County Championship, Anderson took his 1,000th first-class wicket.
Brian Lara
Brian Charles Lara is a Trinidadian former international cricketer, widely acknowledged as one of the greatest batsmen of all time. He topped the Test batting rankings on several occasions and set several cricketing records, including the record for the highest individual score in first-class cricket, with 501 not out for Warwickshire against Durham at Edgbaston in 1994, which is the first quintuple-hundred in first-class cricket history.
Lara set the record for the highest individual score in a Test innings after scoring 400 not out at Antigua during the 4th test against England in 2004. He also set the record of scoring the highest number of runs in a single over in a Test match when he scored 28 runs off an over by Robin Peterson of South Africa in 2003.
Lara’s match-winning performance of 153 not out against Australia in Bridgetown, Barbados in 1999 has been rated by Wisden as the second-best batting performance in the history of Test cricket, next only to the 270 runs scored by Sir Donald Bradman in The Ashes Test match of 1937. Muttiah Muralitharan has hailed Lara as his toughest opponent among all batsmen in the world. Lara was awarded the Wisden Leading Cricketer in the World awards in 1994 and 1995 and is also one of the few cricketers to receive the BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year.
Lara was appointed honorary member of the Order of Australia on 27 November 2009. In September 2012 he was inducted to the ICC’s Hall of Fame as a 2012–13 season inductee. In 2013, he received Honorary Life Membership of the MCC becoming the 31st West Indian to receive the honor.
Brian Lara is popularly nicknamed as “The Prince of Port of Spain” or simply “The Prince”. He has the dubious distinction of playing in a high number of test matches in which his team was on the losing side.
Matthew Cross
Matthew Henry Cross is a Scottish cricketer known for playing with Scotland and is a right-handed wicket-keeper batsman. Cross made his One Day International debut for Scotland against Canada on 23 January 2014.
Matthew Cross served as the Scotland U19 vice-captain during the 2011 U19 World Cup. He began studying Engineering at Loughborough University.
Matthew became a member of Aberdeenshire CC at age nine. His performances with Loughbourgh MCCU and Scotland U19s were considered outstanding. In his career, he has also represented Nottinghamshire 2nd XI and Academy. He made a debut in the Scottish Saltries in the 2013 YB40 match against Hampshire staged at the Ageas Bowl.
Matthew bettered his career stats more in 2013 as he got a break into the Scotland senior squad, which was followed by his selection for the T20 squad to participate in the 2013 World Cup Qualifiers in the UAE.
In 2019, he was selected to play for the Montreal Tigers franchise team in the 2019 Global T20 Canada tournament. He was then selected to play for the Glasgow Giants in the inaugural edition of the Euro T20 Slam cricket tournament. However, the following month the tournament was cancelled.
He was named in Scotland’s squad for the 2019 ICC T20 World Cup Qualifier tournament in the United Arab Emirates. Cross was also named in Scotland’s provisional squad for the 2021 ICC Men’s T20 World Cup.
Imad Wasim
Syed Imad Wasim Haider, commonly known as Imad Wasim, is a Pakistani international cricketer. He is a left-handed all-rounder.
In August 2018, he was one of thirty-three players to be awarded a central contract for the 2018–19 season by the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB). In March 2019, he captained the Pakistan One Day International (ODI) team for the first time.
Sanju Samson
Sanju Viswanath Samson is an Indian international cricketer known as the captain of Kerala in domestic cricket and Rajasthan Royals in Indian Premier League. A right-handed top-order batter and wicketkeeper, he was the vice-captain of the Indian U-19 team for the 2014 Under-19 Cricket World Cup. He made his India debut in the 2015 away T20I against Zimbabwe. He made his ODI debut in 2021 against Sri Lanka.
Sanju started his cricket career in Delhi and later shifted to Kerala in his early teens. After creating waves in junior cricket, he made his first-class debut for Kerala in 2011. He made his IPL debut in 2013 for Rajasthan Royals and won the Best Young Player Award of the season. He scored a 212 in the 2019-20 Vijay Hazare Trophy in the sixth instance an Indian scored a double-century in List A cricket, which is also one of the fastest double tons in the format.
Sanju is a naturally aggressive and flamboyant batsman who is hailed as a natural talent with quality batting techniques and wicket-keeping skills. He is considered an excellent timer of the ball who mostly sticks to his range between cover and fine-leg. He has the ability to play straight and prefers to hit straight over the bowler’s head. Equipped with fast hands, powerful forearms and excellent hand-eye coordination he prefers to stay still at the crease and rarely moves down the track to play shots. He can play aerial shots without moving his head.
His power has been compared to powerful stroke-makers such as Rohit Sharma and AB de Villiers who can middle the ball to play shots with seemingly minimal effort. His batting style has been described as “fearless” in Twenty20 cricket. However, he has a weakness against short of a length deliveries.
He is also an athletic fielder who generally fields in the outfield, but is flexible to field in any position. He has been inconsistent over the years and has been dismissed after getting good starts to an innings quite often in his career. He has been often criticized for his shot selections and temperament.