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S Sreesanth Birthday: Lesser known facts & best ‘performances’ from the World Cup-winning bowler

Sreesanth was the first bowler from Kerala to take a hat-trick in Ranji Trophy. The pacer started attracting people’s attention from his bowling in the early days of his career. He got selected for the Dilip Trophy in his first season in 2002 and bagged 22 wickets in seven matches.

By Anukul Chauhan
Published on :
IPL Spot fixing S Sreesanth Happy Birthday Shantakumaran

Born at Kothamangalam in Kerala on February 6, 1983, Shantakumaran Sreesanth has been one of India’s finest fast bowlers. The highlight of Sreesanth’s bowling was his aggression. At his peak, Sreesanth used to bowl with such sharp length and pace that even the best of batsmen failed to get anything from the bowler. 

Inside or outside the field, Sreesanth always remained in the limelight because of the controversies. Sree was never shy of the controversies ever. But the real shock came in when the name of Sreesanth came up in IPL fixing, the whole world was completely blown away by this fact.  

Early Days

Sreesanth was the first bowler from Kerala to take a hat-trick in Ranji Trophy. The pacer started attracting people’s attention from his bowling in the early days of his career. Though he was part of a weak team in domestic cricket, but it never stopped him from creating his name and proving his class. He got selected for the Dilip Trophy in his first season in 2002 and bagged 22 wickets in seven matches.

International Cricket

Right-hander Pacer Sreesanth stepped into international cricket in the year 2005. In Rahul Dravid’s captaincy, Sreesanth got to play the first ODI against Sri Lanka at Nagpur. The match was won by India, but the last nail of India’s victory was put by Sreesanth. The pacer had claimed 2 wickets for 39 runs in 5.4 overs, making his ODI debut memorable. Then, in 2006, Sreesanth had the opportunity to play the first T20, where he got one wicket.

Part of India’s historic victory

In ODI cricket, Sreesanth definitely proved to be costly in terms of runs, but he was a certified wicket-taker. He did the same in the test. In June 2006, in Antigua, Sreesanth took out the wickets of Ramnaresh Sarwan and Brian Lara (0) in consecutive overs, and then took five wickets in Jamaica and played a key role in giving India a historic victory. 

That year was one of the best for Sreesanth as he took 5 wickets in a spell against South Africa in Johannesburg and helped India win by 123 runs. He bagged 8 wickets in that match at the expense of 99 runs. This was also one of the best spells by Kerala born bowler. 

IPL slap scandal

The slap scandal involving Sreesanth in IPL had been very much in the limelight. In the year 2008, Sreesanth was part of Kings eleven Punjab where his fight with Harbhajan Singh of Mumbai Indians broke out in the field. During the fight, Bhajji gave Sreesanth a strong slap. At that time, there were pictures of Sreesanth crying out of the ground.

The arrest in match-fixing in 2013

The biggest blot of Sreesanth’s career was IPL fixing. In the year 2013, police arrested some cricketers, including Sreesanth, on charges of spot-fixing. Sreesanth was jailed for 27 days. 

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