Ashish Bagai (born 26 January 1982) is the former captain of the

Canadian cricket team The Canada national cricket team represents Canada in international cricket. The team is organised by Cricket Canada, which became an Associate Member of the International Cricket Council (ICC) in 1968. With the United States, Canada was one ...

. He is a right-handed

batsman In cricket, batting is the act or skill of hitting the ball with a bat to score runs and prevent the loss of one's wicket. Any player who is currently batting is, since September 2021, officially referred to as a batter (historically, the ...

who specialises as a

wicketkeeper The wicket-keeper in the sport of cricket is the player on the fielding side who stands behind the wicket or stumps being watchful of the batsman and ready to take a catch, stump the batsman out and run out a batsman when occasion arises. Th ...

Early life

He studied at St. Columba's School during his brief stay in Delhi, India. He moved to Canada at the age of 11.

Career

Early years

His first taste of cricket came in the inaugural Under-15s Cricket World Cup in 1996, in which he was voted the tournament's best wicketkeeper. He had the highest batting average in the Under-19s World Cup in January – February 2000. Going to the 2002 Under-19s World Cup, his batting was invaluable, securing a tie with

Bangladesh Bangladesh (}, ), officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the eighth-most populous country in the world, with a population exceeding 165 million people in an area of . Bangladesh is among the mos ...

. He has since become a face of the

. He has played 52

One Day International A One Day International (ODI) is a form of limited overs cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of overs, currently 50, with the game lasting up to 9 hours. The Cricket World C ...

s, more than any other Canadian player. Indeed, he has played every Canadian ODI since he made his debut in the 2003 World Cup against

. The only Canadian ODIs he has not played in were the three that took place before his birth. Despite his permanent position in the Canadian ODI team, he missed the

2005 ICC Trophy The 2005 ICC Trophy was a cricket tournament held in Ireland between 1 July and 13 July 2005. It was an international one-day tournament played over 50 overs per side between 12 Associate Members of the International Cricket Council. It served a ...

, though he did play the 2001 tournament, the highlight of which was an innings that took the Canadians to victory over the

UAE The United Arab Emirates (UAE; ar, اَلْإِمَارَات الْعَرَبِيَة الْمُتَحِدَة ), or simply the Emirates ( ar, الِْإمَارَات ), is a country in Western Asia (The Middle East). It is located at th ...

after spending a night in hospital due to being hit in the face when keeping. He holds the Canadian record for highest ODI score after his unbeaten 137 in a losing cause against Scotland. In that same ODI he set a record in One Day International cricket for facing the most number of balls in an ODI innings when batting at number three position(172) He added 100 runs for 4th wicket with Asif Mulla which was the first ever century stand for Canada in an ODI.

2011 World Cup and later years

Bagai captained the Canadian team during the 2011 Cricket World Cup and made 64* against Kenya off 97 balls as Canada won their first match of the tournament. This was the second World Cup win Canada had registered. Against New Zealand in the following ODI he scored 84 off 87 balls and he shared a 100+ partnership with

Jimmy Hansra Amarbir Singh "Jimmy" Hansra (born 29 December 1984) is a Canadian cricketer born in Ludhiana, India. He is a middle-order batsman and occasional offspinner. He began playing cricket at a very young age at school, and had an interest in the sp ...

, Hansra eventually made 70*. However Canada lost by 70 runs as New Zealand managed to score 358 in the first innings.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Bagai, Ashish 1982 births Living people Canadian cricketers Indian emigrants to Canada Cricketers from Delhi Canada One Day International cricketers Canada Twenty20 International cricketers Cricketers at the 2003 Cricket World Cup Cricketers at the 2007 Cricket World Cup Cricketers at the 2011 Cricket World Cup St. Columba's School, Delhi alumni Canadian sportspeople of Indian descent Ragama Cricket Club cricketers Wicket-keepers