Vijay Hazare Profile

Full Name: Vijay Samuel Hazare
Born: March 11, 1915, Sangli, Maharashtra
Died: December 18, 2004, Baroda
Major teams: India, Baroda, Central India, Maharashtra
Batting style: Right-hand bat
Bowling style: Right-arm medium

Achievements:
Captained India to its first ever Test win in 1951-52 against England; first Indian batsman to score a triple century in first class cricket; first Indian to score a century in each innings of a Test match (116 and 145 against Australia); first Indian player to make fifty centuries in his first class career.

Vijay Samuel Hazare was an Indian Cricket player. Apart from being an efficient Right Handed Batsman and a Right Arm Medium Bowler, he also served the Indian Cricket team as its Captain during the year 1951-1953, and led the team into 14 matches during the period. He is well known for getting the Indian Cricket team its first victory in a Test match. The match was played against England at Madras on 6th of February 1952, and India won by an innings and 8 runs. Hazare scored 20 runs, and took 1 wicket giving away 15 runs in the match. This was Indian Cricket team�s 25th Test match, and almost 20 years after the team had been given the Test status. Hazare was primarily a batsman, and his batting performance suffered while he served the team as its Captain, although his batting record is still quite impressive.

Early Life
Vijay Hazare was born on 11th of March 1915 at Sangli, Maharashtra in a Marathi Chistian family. He got educated at the Presbyterian Mission Industrial School in Sangli, and was a very religious Christian.

Test Debut
Vijay made his debut in Test Cricket with a match against England played at Lord�s Cricket ground on the 22nd of June 1946. He scored 65 runs, and took 2 wickets giving away 107 runs in the match. His last Test Cricket match was against West Indies played at Kingston on 28th of March 1953. In this match, Vijay scored 28 runs taking no wickets, and gave away 48 runs.

Remarkable Achievements
Hazare was the 1st Indian batsman who scored a Triple century in First class Cricket, as K.S.Duleepsinhji was primarily considered as an English Cricketer. He also was the 1st Indian batsman to score a century in both the innings of a Test match. He achieved this feat in a Test match against Australia played at Adelaide on 23rd of January 1948, and scored 116 runs and 145 runs in both the innings respectively.

Vijay Hazare has also been the 1st Indian Cricket player to score a century in 3 Test matches in a row, and score 50 centuries throughout his First class Cricket career.

Overall Performance
In his overall Test Cricket career, Vijay Hazare played 30 Test matches and scored 2192 runs including 7 centuries and 9 half-centuries with an average of 46.65 runs and a highest score of 164 Not Out. During these matches, he also took 20 wickets giving away 1220 runs with an average of 61.00 runs.

As far as his First class Cricket career is concerned, he played a total of 238 matches, and scored 18740 runs with an average of 58.38 runs and a highest score of 316 Not Out. During these matches, he took 595 wickets and gave away 14645 runs with an average of 24.61 runs.

Other Achievements
After retiring from active Cricket, he served as a Selector for the Indian Test Cricket team for some time. Vijay Hazare along with Jasu Patel was the 1st Indian Cricket player to have been conferred upon the Padma Shri award, and to honor him a Domestic Cricket tournament has been named after him as Vijay Hazare Trophy. He died on 18th of December 2004 of intestinal cancer at Baroda.