Zaheer Khan is an outstanding former Indian cricketer who was a potential weapon in the pace bowling department. He was an important part of the core national team and served his country from 2000 till 2014. Zaheer Khan wife
Zaheer Khan Biography:
Zaheer Khan is the second-most successful Indian pace bowler after the legendary Kapil Dev. Khan was best known for his hostile seam and pace bowling. He could deliver fast inch-perfect Yorkers. He also had the ability to swing the ball in both ways. Khan continues to excel in reverse swing with the old ball.
Zaheer Khan Background:
Zaheer Khan began his Career by playing for Baroda in the Ranji Prize in 1999-2000 season. In the wake of playing for Baroda, he played for Mumbai from 2006 to 2014.
He additionally had the experience of playing area cricket for Surrey and Worcestershire in the years 2004 and 2006 separately. He began his Indian Chief Association vocation playing for the Illustrious Challengers Bangalore. He later played for the Mumbai Indians and Delhi Adrenaline junkies.
The capacity to swing the ball the two different ways, produce invert swing with the more seasoned ball and bowl yorkers at the demise overs made Zaheer an extraordinary bowler.
Zaheer Khan Family:
Zaheer Khan was born on October 7, 1978, in Shrirampur, Maharashtra in a Marathi Muslim family. His father Bakhtiyar Khan was a photographer and mother Zakia Khan was a teacher. He has an elder brother named Zeeshan and a Zaheer’s brother named Anees. Zaheer’s nickname is Zak, Zippy, and Zakky.
The former Indian cricketer attended the New Marathi Primary school and the K.J. Somaiyya Secondary School in Srirampur. He also played in the local Revenue Colony Cricket Club (RCC) in Srirampur, after which he started his career in Pune.
Former Indian Cricketer Zaheer Khan Career:
Zaheer khan a very popular name in the game of cricket, he is one of the finest Indian players to represent the team in many tournaments and also won some prestigious tournaments with the team as well including the 2011 cricket world cup and many other trophies like Asia cup.
Zaheer Khan Early Career:
Zaheer’s cricket career started playing for Baroda. In the finals against Railways in the 2000/01 Ranji season, Zaheer was named Man of the Match. He had taken eight wickets in the match which included a second-innings haul of 5/16. Baroda went on to win the match by a narrow margin of 21 runs and won the trophy after 43 years.
I HAVE REDUCED MY RUN UP… THIS TOUR WILL BE THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL STAGE WHEN I WILL BE BOWLING WITH THE NEW STYLE. I AM A BIT ANXIOUS AND NERVOUS BUT I HOPE IT SHOULD BE OKAY.
In 2005, Zaheer signed for Worcestershire County Cricket Club in England and replaced Shoaib Akhtar as the team’s one of the two overseas players. He made his debut in county cricket against Somerset. Although Worcestershire went on to lose the match, Zaheer took 10 wickets.
Zaheer Khan ODI Career:
Zaheer debut for the men in blue in the year 2000 against Kenya.
The year 2005 was not a good one for Zaheer’s international career. S Sreesanth and R. P. Singh made their international debuts and they soon became a regular member of the national team. It became very difficult for Zaheer to retain his position in the playing eleven.
Even the BCCI (Board of Control for Cricket in India) demoted Zaheer from a B-grade contract to a C-grade contract at the end of the year. He returned to the national side for the 2005 tour of Pakistan. In this tour, India had three left-arm fast bowlers and thus had difficulty in dismissing the Pakistan side due to the lack of variety in the bowling attack by the Indian fast bowlers.
IT WAS NOT EXPLAINED WHY I WAS DROPPED. I WAS SHOCKED AND DISAPPOINTED WHEN I WAS NOT IN THE INDIAN TEST SIDE FOR THE ENGLAND SERIES.
Zaheer won the Man of the Match award in the first test which was held between India and Australia in the 2008-2009 series in India, due to his all-around performance with the bat and ball, and from there Zaheer ODI career takes a swing.
In ODIs, Zaheer Khan has taken 282 wickets at an average of just over 29 runs per wicket. He has taken 4 wickets 6 times, among which 4 times was against Zimbabwe. In total, he has taken 32 ODI wickets against Zimbabwe at an average of 17.46 runs per wicket.
Zaheer has one 5-wicket haul in ODIs against Sri Lanka. He was named Man of the Match thrice in ODIs (twice against New Zealand and once against Zimbabwe).
Zaheer Khan, along with other pace bowlers like Javagal Srinath and Ashish Nehra, helped India to reach the 2003 World Cup finals where they lost against Australia. Zaheer was also the main Indian bowler in the victorious 2011 World Cup campaign.
Zaheer has one 5-wicket haul in ODIs against Sri Lanka. He was named Man of the Match thrice in ODIs (twice against New Zealand and once against Zimbabwe).
Zaheer Khan, along with other pace bowlers like Javagal Srinath and Ashish Nehra, helped India to reach the 2003 World Cup finals where they lost against Australia. Zaheer was also the main Indian bowler in the victorious 2011 World Cup campaign.
Zaheer Khan Test Career:
In tests, Zaheer has taken 311 wickets at an average of just over 32 runs per wicket. From the beginning of West Indies tour in April 2002 to the end of the 1st match against Australia in Brisbane in December 2003, Zaheer had played 16 matches and had taken 54 wickets at an average of 30 runs.
I THOUGHT I WILL USE THE TIME TO WORK ON THOSE THINGS. I THINK IF IT HAS WORKED WELL FOR ME IN DOMESTIC CRICKET, IT SHOULD WORK IN INTERNATIONAL CRICKET AS WELL.
Zaheer’s test record of taking 10-wicket haul in tests against Bangladesh. He took eleven 5-wicket hauls in tests (four times against New Zealand, thrice against Australia, twice against Bangladesh and once against England and Sri Lanka).
Zaheer received five Man of the Match awards in tests (twice against Bangladesh and Australia and once against England). He also won three Man of the Series awards (twice against England and once against Bangladesh).
Zaheer Khan World cup Career and Introduction of Knuckle Ball:
The first bowler to introduce knuckleball in international cricket was Zaheer Khan. He did that during the 2011 World Cup and was very successful with it. The knuckleball helped Zaheer pick crucial wickets of Ian Bell, Paul Collingwood, Devon Smith, and Michael Hussey.
Zaheer later confessed in an interview that he was secretly preparing the knuckleball for the World Cup. Although he had already mastered it beforehand, he never used it before the grand tournament.
In the 2011 World Cup, Zaheer became the joint highest wicket-taker along with Shahid Afridi with 21 wickets. Overall from 2003-2011, Zaheer has taken 44 World Cup wickets. He is tied with Javagal Srinath in the 6th place in the list of World Cup wickets. However, Srinath has played 34 World Cup games while Zaheer has played only 23.
Zaheer Khan IPL and Later Career:
In the Indian Premier League, Zaheer Khan started by playing for Royal Challengers Bangalore (2008, 2011-13), as well as Mumbai Indians (2009-10, 2014) and, was picked by Delhi Daredevils in the 2015 auction. He captained Delhi Daredevils in 2016 and 2017. In the 2017 season, the left-arm fast-medium bowler became the 10th bowler in history and the 8th Indian bowler to pick 100 wickets in IPL.
The medium-fast bowler announced his retirement from international and first-class cricket on October 15, 2015. In 2017, he was appointed as the bowling consultant for the national cricket team of India.
Zaheer Khan Records:
- He became the first Worcestershire player to take 10 wickets on debut match for over 100 years.
- He took the first nine wickets in the first innings in a match against Essex, ending with 9/138. Had the wicket keeper Steven Davies not dropped a catch offered by last man Darren Gough, Zaheer would have become the first bowler ever to take all the ten wickets for the county.
- He held the previous world record for the highest test score by a number 11 when he scored 75 against Bangladesh in 2004.
- He also held the record of India’s highest tenth-wicket partnership of 133 runs along with Sachin Tendulkar.
- He was the fourth-highest wicket-taker in the 2003 World Cup tournament, with 18 wickets from 11 matches at an average of 20 runs per wicket.
- He became the joint highest wicket-taker in 2011 World Cup tournament with 21 wickets, along with Pakistan’s Shahid Afridi.
- He is fifth in the world and leading Indian wicket-taker in a world cup along with Javagal Srinath. Zaheer achieved this feat in 23 matches while Srinath took 34 matches.
- His 300th test wicket was South African all-rounder Jacques Kallis.
- In February 2014, he was ranked 22 in the ICC Player Rankings for Test bowlers.
- He became the oldest player, at the age of 38, to pick up 100 wickets in IPL.
- He was selected as one of the Wisden Cricketers of the Year in 2008.
- He was conferred with Arjuna Award, India’s second highest sporting award by the President of India, in 2011.
- He has dismissed South Africa’s Graeme Smith for the most number of times in his career (13 times in 25 matches).
Zaheer Khan records as such which any fast bowler would love to have in his name in this cricket fraternity.
Zaheer Khan Net Worth:
With an annual income of $8 million and endorsements of $0.4 million, net worth of Zaheer Khan is around $34-35 million. After retiring, Zaheer took up commentary for BCCI. He is the brand ambassador and co-owner of popular clothing brand ‘Sher Khan’. Apart from that Zaheer Khan restaurant named ‘Zaheer Khan’s Dine Fine’ and also a sports lounge in Pune named ‘TOSS’.
Zaheer Khan Wife-(Sagarika Ghatge):
The medium fast bowler is married to Bollywood actress Sagarika Ghatge. Zaheer Khan and his wife met through mutual friends and instantly hit it off. Zaheer himself announced his engagement on his official twitter account on April 24, 2017. The couple got married on November 23, 2017.
Zaheer khan wife Sagarika Ghatge is an Indian model and film actress who played the role of Preeti Sabarwal, a fictional member of the Indian women’s national hockey team, in her debut film Chak De! India. She also participated in Fear Factor: Khatron Ke Khiladi (season 6) and went on to be a finalist.
For Chak De! India, Zaheer Khan wife was awarded the Screen Award for Best Supporting Actress and Lions Gold Award. After that film, Sagarika became the brand ambassador of Reebok India. In 2009, she played Urvashi Mathur in the film ‘Fox’ and Kamiah in ‘Miley Naa Miley Hum’. In 2012, she appeared in ‘Rush’ opposite Emraan Hashmi.
She debuted in Marathi film ‘Premachi Goshta’ with Atul Kulkarni in 2013. In 2015 she debuted in Punjabi film ‘Dildariyaan’ opposite Jassi Gill. In 2017 she played Maya Singh in the film ‘Irada’. Sagarika made her digital debut for ALT Balaji in ‘Boss – Baap of Special Services’. There she plays the role of ACP Sakshi Ranjan opposite Karan Singh Grover. Sagarika’s upcoming film is the bilingual Hindi-Marathi film ‘Monsoon Football’.
Association with Mumbai Indians:
After retirement from cricket, the former Indian cricketer medium, fast bowler decided to start his career as a coach and got associated with the IPL team Mumbai Indians.
Zaheer is the bowling consultant for the team and under his guidance, the team has been delivering some great bowling attacks.