Irfan Khan Pathan was born on the 27th of October,
1984 in Baroda, Gujarat. He is popularly known by the nick name ‘Guddu’ in the Pathan
household.
He made his international as well as first class cricket
debut in the year 2003/2004 against Australia in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy.
But not many of you know how he grew up and how he made it
big to the international circuit, Irfan grew up in a mosque in Baroda in an
impoverished family where his father use to work as a ‘muezzin’, his parents
wanted him to be an Islamic scholar but Irfan had other plans, his interest since
childhood was into cricket, he started playing cricket with his brother Yusuf
Pathan in the mosque compound & also on the streets of Baroda. In the beginning his deliveries not even use to
reach the end of the cricket pitch but he had sheer determination, so he used
to train rigorously for daily six to seven hours in the severe heat and get
himself trained to bowl fast.
Under the guidance of former Indian Captain Datta Gaekwad,
Irfan got selected in the Baroda under 14 years cricket team and then there was
no looking back, his performances made his cricket team to win in the domestic
ranji trophy season consequently for two three years, which eventually got him
selected at the age of 19 in the National Indian Cricket Team.
Irfan Pathan announced his arrival to the cricketing circuit
in fashion when he was named the ‘Emerging Player’ by the International Cricket
Council (ICC) in the year 2004, which was just six months after his test debut
against Australia.
He soon became the cricket’s ‘blue eyed boy’, the handsome boy
from Baroda made it big in cricket in the year 2006 when India was on tour to
Pakistan, It was that historic day of 29th January 2006 at the
National Stadium in Karachi, Pakistan where India v/s Pakistan 3rd
Test match was played. In that test match Pathan emerged as India’s seam and
swing bowler when he produced three magical deliveries to get rid of three of
the most dangerous batsman’s of all time Pakistan has ever produced.
His first ball got Salman Butt out, the very next ball was a
beauty which got Younis Khan out & then the third became his hat trick ball
which got Mohammad Yusuf out, three of Pakistan’s leading run scorers were dismissed
by Irfan on a golden duck.
This is how Irfan Pathan became the benchmark for all those
small town players who dreamt of making it big in Cricket post that.
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