Venkatapathy Raju Biography 
Venkatapathy Raju is a former cricketer of Indian team. He was a spin bowler (Slow left-arm orthodox) and right handed batsman for his team. He debut Indian team during 1989-1990 season and was with the time till middle 1990’s. He retired from first-class cricket in December 2004 after playing a domestic match against Uttar Pradesh. He has received ‘Man of Match’ title only once in his career. It happened with his match winning bowling figures of 8 for 37 in 53 overs in a test match against Sri Lanka. He was the last minute choice of the selectors for the team.
Raju reached Indian team in 1989 after getting 32 wickets in domestic cricket. He was born on July 9, 1969 in Alamuru, Hyderabad. He debut test cricket in 1990 in a match against New Zealand played on March 1st. He claimed 3 wickets in the first innings giving 86 runs. India had to follow on in that test match, just survived innings fall by 2 runs and New Zealand won the match with 10 wickets in hand with just one over bowled. His last test was played at Eden gardens, Kolkata in 2001 against Australia. But he couldn’t get any success thus putting an end to his bowling career.
His ODI debut also happened against New Zealand in the same series of 1990 where his bowling was not fruitful. His last ODI happened in Manchester against England in 1996. He has won India’s cap for 28 test matches and 53 One day International. He took 93 wickets from tests at an average of 30.72 and 63 wickets from ODI. His best bowling figures are 6/12 in tests and 4/46 in ODI. He played with his hometown Hyderabad time till early 2000’s and retired from first class cricket in 2004.
Published: N/A
Updated: January 23, 2014
