Chetan Sharma
Encyclopedia
Chetan Sharma was a medium pace bowler who represented India
at cricket
.
Sharma was coached by Desh Prem Azad, a Dronacharya Award
winner, who was also the mentor of Kapil Dev
. Despite being only 5' 3" tall, the bearded Sharma was one of the fastest bowlers in India during the 1980s.
He made his first class debut for Haryana
at the age of 16 and appeared in One Day Internationals a year later. Making his first appearance in Tests against Pakistan
at Lahore
in 1984, he bowled Mohsin Khan with his fifth ball - becoming the third Indian to take a wicket in his first over in Test cricket. He took fourteen wickets in the three Tests in Sri Lanka
in 1985. Later that season in Australia
, with India needing a win in the last match of the league to qualify for the final of the World Series Cup
, he played a match-winning innings of 38*.
Sharma was an important member of the Indian team that defeated England
2-0 in 1986. He took sixteen wickets in the two Tests that he played. He took 10 wickets at Birmingham
, including a career best 6 for 58 in the second innings. It remains the only ten wicket haul by an Indian in England. Though only twenty at this time, he picked up frequent injuries which restricted his career. When available, he was the first choice as the opening bowler with Kapil Dev for the next three years.
For his ability to get useful runs down the order that too at quick rate, Chetan was seen as a natural successor to Kapil Dev in the all-rounder category. By the early nineties, his bowling dropped in pace and its sharpness and his strike rate had dropped considerably especially on Indian grounds.
In the Reliance World Cup
in 1987, Sharma took the first hat-trick
in the history of tournament when he clean bowled Ken Rutherford
, Ian Smith and Ewen Chatfield
of New Zealand
off consecutive balls. He played the most noted innings of his career against England in the Nehru Cup in 1989. Sent in at No.3 with India facing a target of 256, he scored a 101* in 96 balls, completing his hundred with the match-winning run. He made another important contribution in India's win against Australia
in the next match, sharing an unfinished partnership of 40 runs with Manoj Prabhakar
and ending the match with a six. But his bowling had waned considerably and he was excluded from the tour of Pakistan a few weeks later.
Sharma received few opportunities thereafter. In one of his last international appearances, against New Zealand in a three nations tournament in 1994 he ended up with figures of 1-0-23-0 after being hit for five fours off consecutive balls by Stephen Fleming
. He moved from Haryana to Bengal in 1993 and stayed there till the end of his career in 1996.
Sharma is also infamously remembered for bowling the last over in the final of the Austral-asia cup in Sharjah in 1986. With Pakistan needing four runs off the last ball to win, he bowled a low full toss
outside the leg stump, which was hit for six by Javed Miandad
. That defeat exasperates many Indian cricket fans to this day.
After his retirement, Chetan became a cricket commentator
. He opened a cricket academy in Panchkula
in Haryana in 2004. Chetan is the nephew of the former Indian cricketer Yashpal Sharma
.
Chetan contested the Lok Sabha
(2009) polls from Faridabad
on a Bahujan Samaj Party
(BSP) ticket.
He generally gives his views in Hindi. He is known for his outright thoughts on television but sometimes which gets extravagant.On one instance in a post match analysis of an ODI on DD national, he said he is better than Ajit Agarkar just on the basis of one bad performance in the match.He couldn't support is argument when a phone caller on the programme reminded him that Ajit is the third most successful bowlers in ODIs with highest number of 4 wickets haul,adding to it he has a test match century and a high score of 95 in ODIs.
He has a perchance of bringing his ODI hatrick in discussion. He is often interviewed regarding his last ball full toss which was hit for a Six by javid Miadad ,when pakistan required 4 Runs to win the match on last ball.
He has a passion for bicycles and owns a number of bicycles which were gifted to him during his cricket playing days. He is occasionally seen driving them to his office. He loves his cricket souvenirs and still wears the cricket shoes and vests those he wore in in the 1987 cricket world cup as a goodwill charm.
He is often seen donating hundred of rupees to old age homes and orphanages.
He has endorsed fairness creams advertisement papads, anti termite sprays and kids pads and shoes.
Indian cricket team
The Indian cricket team is the national cricket team of India. Governed by the Board of Control for Cricket in India , it is a full member of the International Cricket Council with Test and One Day International status....
at cricket
Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the...
.
Sharma was coached by Desh Prem Azad, a Dronacharya Award
Dronacharya Award
Dronacharya Award is an award presented by the government of India for excellence in sports coaching. The award comprises a bronze statuette of Dronacharya, a scroll of honour and a cash component of Rs.500,000...
winner, who was also the mentor of Kapil Dev
Kapil Dev
Kapil Dev Ramlal Nikhanj , better known as Kapil Dev, is a former Indian cricketer. He captained the Indian cricket team which won the 1983 Cricket World Cup...
. Despite being only 5' 3" tall, the bearded Sharma was one of the fastest bowlers in India during the 1980s.
He made his first class debut for Haryana
Haryana
Haryana is a state in India. Historically, it has been a part of the Kuru region in North India. The name Haryana is found mentioned in the 12th century AD by the apabhramsha writer Vibudh Shridhar . It is bordered by Punjab and Himachal Pradesh to the north, and by Rajasthan to the west and south...
at the age of 16 and appeared in One Day Internationals a year later. Making his first appearance in Tests against Pakistan
Pakistani cricket team
The Pakistan cricket team is the national cricket team of Pakistan. Pakistan, represented by the Pakistan Cricket Board , is a full member of the International Cricket Council, and thus participates in , and cricket matches....
at Lahore
Gaddafi Stadium
Gaddafi Stadium is a cricket ground in Lahore, Pakistan. It was designed by Daghestani-born architect and engineer Nasreddin Murat-Khan who also designed Lahore's Minar-e-Pakistan and constructed by Mian Abdul Khaliq and Company in 1959. Following the ground's renovation for the 1996 Cricket World...
in 1984, he bowled Mohsin Khan with his fifth ball - becoming the third Indian to take a wicket in his first over in Test cricket. He took fourteen wickets in the three Tests in Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...
in 1985. Later that season in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, with India needing a win in the last match of the league to qualify for the final of the World Series Cup
World Series Cup
The World Series Cup was the name of the One Day International cricket tournament that took place in Australia every season between Australia and two touring teams from 1979-80 to 1995-96. The tournament was renamed the World Series from 1990-1. This was the very first of the One Day International ...
, he played a match-winning innings of 38*.
Sharma was an important member of the Indian team that defeated England
English cricket team
The England and Wales cricket team is a cricket team which represents England and Wales. Until 1992 it also represented Scotland. Since 1 January 1997 it has been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board , having been previously governed by Marylebone Cricket Club from 1903 until the end...
2-0 in 1986. He took sixteen wickets in the two Tests that he played. He took 10 wickets at Birmingham
Edgbaston Cricket Ground
Edgbaston Cricket Ground, also known as the County Ground or Edgbaston Stadium, is a cricket ground in the Edgbaston area of Birmingham, England...
, including a career best 6 for 58 in the second innings. It remains the only ten wicket haul by an Indian in England. Though only twenty at this time, he picked up frequent injuries which restricted his career. When available, he was the first choice as the opening bowler with Kapil Dev for the next three years.
For his ability to get useful runs down the order that too at quick rate, Chetan was seen as a natural successor to Kapil Dev in the all-rounder category. By the early nineties, his bowling dropped in pace and its sharpness and his strike rate had dropped considerably especially on Indian grounds.
In the Reliance World Cup
1987 Cricket World Cup
The 1987 Cricket World Cup was the fourth edition of the ICC Cricket World Cup tournament. It was held from October 8 to November 8, 1987 in India and Pakistan — the first held outside England. The format was unchanged from 1983 except for a reduction in the number of overs a team played from 60...
in 1987, Sharma took the first hat-trick
Hat-trick
A hat-trick or hat trick in sport is the achievement of a positive feat three times during a game, or other achievements based on threes. The term was first used in 1858 in cricket to describe HH Stephenson's feat of taking three wickets in three balls. A collection was held for Stephenson, and he...
in the history of tournament when he clean bowled Ken Rutherford
Ken Rutherford (cricketer)
Kenneth Robert Rutherford is a former New Zealand cricketer who enjoyed a ten-year career with the national team, and was captain for a period. Aged 19, with a solitary first class season behind him, he was asked to open the batting for New Zealand against West Indies when the latter were at the...
, Ian Smith and Ewen Chatfield
Ewen Chatfield
Ewen John Chatfield is a former cricketer who played 43 Tests and 114 One Day Internationals for New Zealand. A medium-pace bowler, his chief weapon was his accuracy, giving him economical bowling figures, although he occasionally would come in for punishment in the late stages of limited overs...
of New Zealand
New Zealand cricket team
The New Zealand cricket team, nicknamed the Black Caps, are the national cricket team representing New Zealand. They played their first in 1930 against England in Christchurch, New Zealand, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. It took the team until 1955–56 to win a Test, against the...
off consecutive balls. He played the most noted innings of his career against England in the Nehru Cup in 1989. Sent in at No.3 with India facing a target of 256, he scored a 101* in 96 balls, completing his hundred with the match-winning run. He made another important contribution in India's win against Australia
Australian cricket team
The Australian cricket team is the national cricket team of Australia. It is the joint oldest team in Test cricket, having played in the first Test match in 1877...
in the next match, sharing an unfinished partnership of 40 runs with Manoj Prabhakar
Manoj Prabhakar
Manoj Prabhakar is a former Indian cricketer. He was a right-arm medium-pace bowler and a lower-order batsman who also opened the innings sometimes for the Indian cricket team until his retirement in 1995–96. He was banned by the BCCI for his involvement in match fixing scandals...
and ending the match with a six. But his bowling had waned considerably and he was excluded from the tour of Pakistan a few weeks later.
Sharma received few opportunities thereafter. In one of his last international appearances, against New Zealand in a three nations tournament in 1994 he ended up with figures of 1-0-23-0 after being hit for five fours off consecutive balls by Stephen Fleming
Stephen Fleming
Stephen Paul Fleming ONZM is a New Zealand cricketer, and the former captain of the New Zealand national cricket team, known as the Black Caps, in Test and one-day cricket...
. He moved from Haryana to Bengal in 1993 and stayed there till the end of his career in 1996.
Sharma is also infamously remembered for bowling the last over in the final of the Austral-asia cup in Sharjah in 1986. With Pakistan needing four runs off the last ball to win, he bowled a low full toss
Full toss
A full toss is a type of delivery in the sport of cricket. It describes any delivery that reaches the batsman without bouncing on the pitch first....
outside the leg stump, which was hit for six by Javed Miandad
Javed Miandad
Mohammad Javed Miandad Khan , popularly known as Javed Miandad , is a former Pakistani cricketer who played between 1975 and 1996. He is Pakistan's leading run scorer in Test cricket. He has served as a captain of the Pakistan national cricket team...
. That defeat exasperates many Indian cricket fans to this day.
After his retirement, Chetan became a cricket commentator
Sportscaster
In sports broadcasting, a commentator gives a running commentary of a game or event in real time, usually during a live broadcast. The comments are normally a voiceover, with the sounds of the action and spectators also heard in the background. In the case of television commentary, the commentator...
. He opened a cricket academy in Panchkula
Panchkula
Panchkula is a planned city in Panchkula district, Haryana, India. It is a satellite city of the Union Territory of Chandigarh. It also shares seamless border with Mohali district in Punjab. The prestigious Chandimandir Cantonment Headquarters of the Indian Army Western Command, is also located in...
in Haryana in 2004. Chetan is the nephew of the former Indian cricketer Yashpal Sharma
Yashpal Sharma
Yashpal Sharma is a former Indian cricketer. He was a middle order batsman who played at the turn of the 1980s.-Early career:...
.
Chetan contested the Lok Sabha
Lok Sabha
The Lok Sabha or House of the People is the lower house of the Parliament of India. Members of the Lok Sabha are elected by direct election under universal adult suffrage. As of 2009, there have been fifteen Lok Sabhas elected by the people of India...
(2009) polls from Faridabad
Faridabad
Faridabad is a city in the south-east of Haryana state in northern India, in Faridabad district. It lies at 28º 25' 16" N Latitude and 77º 18' 28" E Longitude. The district shares its boundaries with the National Capital and Union Territory of Delhi to its north, Gurgaon district to the west and...
on a Bahujan Samaj Party
Bahujan Samaj Party
The Bahujan Samaj Party is a centrist national political party in India with socialist leanings. It was formed to chiefly represent Bahujans , referring to people from the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Castes as well as Buddhists. The party claims to be inspired by the...
(BSP) ticket.
Cricket Analyst Career
He was given a career as a cricket expert along with Anjum Chopra ,Vijay Dhayia ,Krishnamcharya Srikanth on DD National.Later On he started working with India Tv as well.He generally gives his views in Hindi. He is known for his outright thoughts on television but sometimes which gets extravagant.On one instance in a post match analysis of an ODI on DD national, he said he is better than Ajit Agarkar just on the basis of one bad performance in the match.He couldn't support is argument when a phone caller on the programme reminded him that Ajit is the third most successful bowlers in ODIs with highest number of 4 wickets haul,adding to it he has a test match century and a high score of 95 in ODIs.
He has a perchance of bringing his ODI hatrick in discussion. He is often interviewed regarding his last ball full toss which was hit for a Six by javid Miadad ,when pakistan required 4 Runs to win the match on last ball.
He has a passion for bicycles and owns a number of bicycles which were gifted to him during his cricket playing days. He is occasionally seen driving them to his office. He loves his cricket souvenirs and still wears the cricket shoes and vests those he wore in in the 1987 cricket world cup as a goodwill charm.
He is often seen donating hundred of rupees to old age homes and orphanages.
He has endorsed fairness creams advertisement papads, anti termite sprays and kids pads and shoes.