James Douglas Sheahan Neesham (born 17 September 1990), better known as Jimmy Neesham, is a New Zealand international

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

er who has played for

New Zealand cricket team The New Zealand national cricket team represents New Zealand in men's international cricket. Named the Black Caps, they played their first Test in 1930 against England in Christchurch, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. From 1930 ...

. He currently plays in various T20 leagues around the globe as an

All-rounder An all-rounder is a cricketer who regularly performs well at both batting and bowling. Although all bowlers must bat and quite a handful of batsmen do bowl occasionally, most players are skilled in only one of the two disciplines and are consi ...

Domestic and T20 franchise career

Neesham began his first-class career with Auckland, but a move to Otago Volts worked well for him, as he made some important contributions in the 50-over format in the 2011/12 season, making three 40-plus scores in seven innings, all of them coming at more than a run a ball. He was among the wickets too, taking a career-best 5 for 44 against Wellington and 4 for 23 against Canterbury. The rewards came soon, as he was included in the limited-overs squads for the tour to South Africa. Neesham was picked in IPL by

Delhi Daredevils Delhi Capitals (formerly Delhi Daredevils) are a franchise cricket team based out of Delhi in the Indian Premier League (IPL). The franchise is jointly owned by the GMR Group and the JSW Group. The team's home ground is Arun Jaitley Stadium, ...

for season 7 and played for

Guyana Amazon Warriors The Guyana Amazon Warriors is a franchise cricket team of the Caribbean Premier League based in Providence, Georgetown, Guyana. The team is the representative cricket team of Guyana in the Caribbean Premier League. It was one of the six teams c ...

in the 2014

Caribbean Premier League The Caribbean Premier League (abbreviated to CPL or CPLT20) is an annual Twenty20 cricket tournament held in the Caribbean. It was founded by Cricket West Indies in 2013 to replace the Caribbean Twenty20 as the premier Twenty20 competition in t ...

, and for

Derbyshire Derbyshire ( ) is a ceremonial county in the East Midlands, England. It includes much of the Peak District National Park, the southern end of the Pennine range of hills and part of the National Forest. It borders Greater Manchester to the nor ...

in the English

2016 NatWest t20 Blast The 2016 NatWest T20 Blast is the third season of the domestic T20 competition, run by the ECB, branded as the NatWest t20 Blast. The league consists of the 18 first-class county teams divided into two divisions of nine teams each with fixtures ...

. In June 2017 he signed to play for

Kent County Cricket Club Kent County Cricket Club is one of the eighteen first-class county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the historic county of Kent. A club representing the county was first founded in 1842 but Ke ...

in the 2017 NatWest t20 Blast, making his debut in Kent's opening match of the tournament in July.Jimmy Neesham: New Zealand all-rounder joins Kent for T20 Blast

BBC Sport BBC Sport is the sports division of the BBC, providing national sports coverage for BBC television, radio and online. The BBC holds the television and radio UK broadcasting rights to several sports, broadcasting the sport live or alongside flag ...

, 26 June 2017. Retrieved 26 June 2017.Panting M (2017
Jimmy Neesham shows what he can do with three wickets on Kent Spitfires debut
''

Kent Online KM Media Group is a multimedia company in the county of Kent, England which originated as the publisher of the Kent Messenger. The Group now produces local newspapers, radio stations and websites throughout the county. Iliffe Media acquired KM ...

'', 10 July 2017. Retrieved 10 July 2017. In June 2018, Neesham was awarded a contract with Wellington for the 2018–19 season. In June 2019, he was selected to play for the Edmonton Royals franchise team in the

2019 Global T20 Canada The 2019 Global T20 Canada was the second edition of the Global T20 Canada, a 20-over professional cricket tournament, played at the CAA Centre, Brampton, Ontario. It started on 25 July 2019, and concluded with the final on 11 August 2019. It ...

tournament. In the 2020 IPL auction, he was bought by the

Kings XI Punjab Punjab Kings (PBKS) are a franchise cricket team based in Mohali, Punjab, that plays in the Indian Premier League (IPL). Established in 2008 as the Kings XI Punjab (KXIP), the franchise is jointly owned by Mohit Burman, Ness Wadia, Preity Zi ...

and in 2021 was bought by

Mumbai Indians Mumbai Indians are a franchise cricket team based in Mumbai, Maharashtra, that competes in the Indian Premier League and is the most successful team of the tournament with 5 titles. Founded in 2008, the team is owned by India's biggest conglo ...

. In February 2022, he was bought by the

Rajasthan Royals Rajasthan Royals (often abbreviated as RR) are a franchise cricket team based in Jaipur, Rajasthan, that plays in the Indian Premier League (IPL). Founded in 2008 as one of the initial eight IPL franchises, the team is based at the Sawai Ma ...

in the

auction An auction is usually a process of buying and selling goods or services by offering them up for bids, taking bids, and then selling the item to the highest bidder or buying the item from the lowest bidder. Some exceptions to this definition ex ...

for the

2022 Indian Premier League The 2022 Indian Premier League, also known as IPL 15 or for sponsorship reasons, Tata IPL 2022, was the fifteenth season of the Indian Premier League (IPL), a professional Twenty20 cricket league established by the Board of Control for Cricke ...

tournament.

International career

Neesham made his Test debut against

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

, scoring an unbeaten 137, the highest score on debut by a Test number 8 batsman. In June 2014, he made a century in his second test against the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater A ...

, becoming the first New Zealander to score centuries in his first two matches. Neesham was named in New Zealand's 15 man squad for the 2017 ICC Champions Trophy. On 3 January 2019, in the first ODI against Sri Lanka, Neesham scored 34 runs in one over, including five sixes. This was the most runs scored in one over by a New Zealand batsman in an ODI match. In April 2019, he was named in New Zealand's squad for the

2019 Cricket World Cup The 2019 ICC Cricket World Cup was the 12th Cricket World Cup, a quadrennial One Day International (ODI) cricket tournament contested by men's national teams and organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC). It was hosted between 30 May ...

. On 1 June 2019, in New Zealand's first match of the World Cup, Neesham played in his 50th ODI. In New Zealand's match against

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...

, Neesham took his first

five-wicket haul In cricket, a five-wicket haul (also known as a "five–for" or "fifer") occurs when a bowler takes five or more wickets in a single innings. This is regarded by critics as a notable achievement, equivalent to a century from a batsman. Takin ...

and his 50th wicket in ODIs. In the

semifinal, Neesham took the final wicket, and a stunning catch to dismiss

Dinesh Karthik Krishnakumar Dinesh Karthik (born 1 June 1985) is an Indian professional cricketer and commentator who nationally plays for the Indian Cricket Team and currently in Indian Premier League playing for Royal Challengers Bangalore. He is also the ...

off Matt Henry's delivery. Before the World Cup Neesham revealed that he had considered retiring from international cricket 18 months prior due to poor form and injury problems but Heath Mills, the then CEO of the New Zealand Players Association, advised him to take break from cricket for 3–4 weeks and to not retire. In August 2021, Neesham was named in New Zealand's squad for the

2021 ICC Men's T20 World Cup The 2021 ICC Men's T20 World Cup was the seventh ICC Men's T20 World Cup tournament, with the matches played in the United Arab Emirates and Oman from 17 October to 14 November 2021. The West Indies were the defending champions, but were eventua ...

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Neesham, Jimmy 1990 births Auckland cricketers Cricketers at the 2019 Cricket World Cup Cricketers who made a century on Test debut Delhi Capitals cricketers Derbyshire cricketers Essex cricketers Guyana Amazon Warriors cricketers Kent cricketers Living people Mumbai Indians cricketers New Zealand Test cricketers New Zealand One Day International cricketers New Zealand Twenty20 International cricketers North Island cricketers Otago cricketers Punjab Kings cricketers Trinbago Knight Riders cricketers Wellington cricketers Welsh Fire cricketers Rajasthan Royals cricketers