Mohammed Shami


Mohammed Shami Ahmed is an Indian international cricketer who plays as a right-arm fast-bowler, for the India national cricket team and for the Bengal in domestic cricket and for the Lucknow Super Giants in the Indian Premier League. He also plays for Mohun Bagan in domestic competitions of West Bengal. One of the most consistent wicket takers in contemporary world cricket, Shami bowls the ball off the seam and uses swing, including reverse swing, to move the ball both directions. He has been reputed to have an edge in the death overs of a limited-overs innings and, in all formats, has been described as being at times "unplayable". Shami finished as the tournament's leading wicket taker in the ICC World Cup 2023, besides being the fastest bowler to take 50 wickets in the 48 years history of Cricket World Cup spanning 13 editions. He is recipient of 2023 Arjuna Award for Cricket. Having taken 7 wickets for 57 runs against New Zealand in the 2023 Cricket World Cup semi final, he holds the record for the best figures for an Indian Bowler in ODIs, and is currently, the only Indian bowler to have taken 7 wickets in an ODI innings. Shami was a member of the Indian team that won the 2025 ICC Champions Trophy.

Early life and career

Shami grew up in the village of Sahaspur in Amroha, Uttar Pradesh, one of five children. His father, Tauseef Ali was a farmer who had been a fast bowler in his youth. When Shami was 15 he was taken to Badruddin Siddique, a cricket coach in Moradabad, a town from his home.
Shami worked hard on his technique throughout his time at Moradabad; after matches, he would request the used balls so that he could develop the ability to reverse swing the older ball, a skill that would be integral to his success later in his career. He was not, however, selected for the Uttar Pradesh under-19 team, and later in 2005 Badruddin sent him to Kolkata to increase his chances of selection for a state team. After playing for the Dalhousie Athletic Club, he was recommended to Debabrata Das, a former assistant secretary of the Cricket Association of Bengal, who was impressed with Shami's bowling and asked him to join his own club, Town Club. Das took Shami, who had no place to stay in Kolkata, to live with him. After bowling well for Town Club, Das asked one of the Bengal selectors, Sambaran Banerjee, to watch Shami bowl; Banerjee was impressed and selected him for the Bengal under-22 team.
Shami later joined Mohun Bagan Cricket Club, one of the best teams in Bengal, in order to be considered for selection to the full state team. He bowled to former Indian captain Sourav Ganguly in the Eden Gardens nets; Ganguly recommended him to the state selectors and, soon afterwards, Shami was included in the Bengal squad for the 2010–11 Ranji Trophy.

Domestic career

Shami took four wickets on his senior debut for Bengal in a Twenty20 match in October 2010. The following month, he made his first-class cricket debut against Assam at Eden Gardens, taking three wickets in a high scoring match.
In February 2012 his bowling helped East Zone win their first Duleep Trophy title; he took eight wickets in the match and was described as "outstanding, consistently getting bounce and zip from just short of a good length". He had only played in the match following an injury to Abu Nechim, but it proved to be a significant breakthrough in Shami's career; he had been described as "little-known" before the match, but by April was being touted as a player to watch in the upcoming Indian Premier League season.
He was selected to tour the West Indies with the India A team and "impressed" with his bowling on pitches which were considered to be generally unhelpful to fast bowlers. Shami was considered to have been the "surprise package" of the tour for India A, and impressed the team's coach Lalchand Rajput with his strength and consistency whilst bowling, as well as with his batting; batting tenth in the first unofficial Test match, he scored 27 runs in a partnership of 73 with Cheteshwar Pujara which won the match for India A. Later in the year he was one of only two fast bowlers retained for the India A tour of New Zealand, although he only played in two of the six matches on the tour.
During the 2012–13 Ranji Trophy, Shami took 11 wickets in a match against Madhya Pradesh in November, including seven wickets for 79 runs in the first innings, a return which included a hat-trick. The following month he took 4/36 and 6/71 against Hyderabad on a green wicket at Eden Gardens, his second ten-wicket match in only his 15th first-class game. In the five Ranji Trophy matches he played during the season he took 28 wickets at a bowling average of 21.25 runs per wicket, and in the 18 first-class matches he played before his Test match debut in 2013 he took 71 wickets, an average of four wickets each match.
Since making his international debut in 2013, Shami has played only occasionally for his state team. He played a limited overs match in March 2017 after not having played any competitive cricket for a period of four months, and took part in four Ranji Trophy matches later in 2017, his first for around five years, to develop and maintain his fitness. A single first-class match for Bengal followed in 2018—with the BCCI requesting that he be limited to bowling no more than 15 overs in each innings in the match to ensure his fitness for an upcoming Test series. Shami has not played for Bengal since 2018/19 season.

International cricket

Test career

2013 to 2018

Shami made his Test debut against West Indies in November 2013 in front of his home crowd at Eden Gardens, Kolkata. In the first innings, he took his maiden Test wicket – that of Kieran Powell – and finished with figures of 4/71. In the second innings, he took 5/47. His match total of nine wickets, for 118 runs, is the most by an Indian pacer on debut, surpassing Munaf Patel's seven wickets for 97 runs at Mohali in 2006.
File:Mohammed Shami.jpg|left|thumb|Shami warming up before a match against Australia in Sydney Cricket Ground in 2015
Shami had little success on India's 2014 tour of England, however, finishing with just five wickets in three matches. He was involved in a 111-run partnership for the 10th wicket, with Bhuvneshwar Kumar in the first Test at Trent Bridge, scoring his maiden half-century in the process and helping India post 457 in the first innings.
He took 15 wickets in three Tests during India's 2014–15 tour of Australia, and went on to become the 20th Indian fast bowler to take 100 Test wickets, reaching the milestone in 29 Tests.
In 2018, he toured England with India, playing in all five Tests. He finished the series with 16 wickets, including six in the fourth Test.

2019–21 ICC World Test Championship

During the 2019–21 ICC World Test Championship, in the 2019 India-West Indies two-match Test series, Shami took nine wickets. He took thirteen in the home series against South Africa and five in New Zealand. He was included in the playing XI of the first international pink ball Test match organised in India, at Eden Gardens, the second Test of the 2019–20 Bangladesh tour of India, in which he took two wickets. During this series, Shami reached seventh position in the ICC Men's Player Rankings after taking seven wickets in the first Test. His rating of 790 points was then the third-best achieved by an India pace bowler, behind only Kapil Dev and Jasprit Bumrah. During the 2020–21 tour of Australia, Shami suffered a broken arm while batting against Pat Cummins during the second innings of the first Test. He retired hurt and was ruled out of the rest of the series.
File:Players gathering in the field for national anthems.jpg|thumb|The Rose Bowl during the final of 2019–21 WTC ––– Shami was part of that match.
Shami was the joint-tenth highest wicket taker in the tournament, along with Jofra Archer, with 40 wickets in total. He was the highest wicket taker among the Indian pacers and the second highest of all Indian bowlers, behind only Ravichandran Ashwin.
Shami played in the Test Championship final against New Zealand at The Rose Bowl in Southampton. He took four wickets in the first innings, but New Zealand won the match by 8 wickets.

2021–23 ICC World Test Championship

During the 2021–23 ICC World Test Championship, in the 2021 India-England series, on 16 August 2021, in India's second innings, Shami made his highest score and second half-century in Test cricket, with an unbeaten score of 56* in a partnership with Jasprit Bumrah, which helped team India to script a historical win against England. Playing 3 matches in the 5-match series, Shami finished as the fifth highest wicket-taker of the series with 11 wickets with the best figures of 4/95 coming during the first innings of the third match of the series.
During the first innings of the first Test of the India-South Africa 2021–22 Test series, Shami took 5 wickets for 44 runs and became the fifth Indian pacer to take 200 wickets in Test cricket. For his performances, the former head coach of India, Ravi Shastri lauded him as 'The Sultan of Bengal' on Twitter. At the end of the match, which India eventually won, the Test captain of team India, Virat Kohli eulogised Shami for taking 8 wickets total in the match saying "For me he's in the best three seamers in the world at the moment." He finished the series with 14 wickets from 3 matches as the leading wicket taker of India in the series.

ODI career

As a result of his performances in domestic matches, Shami was selected for India's One Day international series against Pakistan, replacing his Bengali teammate Ashok Dinda and subsequently made his debut in the third ODI of the series in Delhi on 6 January 2013 and he returned figures of 1/23 from 9 overs in a low-scoring game that India won by 10 runs. In October 2013, he was selected in India's squad to face the touring Australians. After being left out of the team for the first three ODI matches, he played in all the remaining matches, taking seven wickets, including two three-wicket hauls and emerged as the fourth leading wicket-taker of the series.
In India's tour of New Zealand in 2014, Shami took 11 wickets in ODIs at an average of 28.72. He ended the 2014 Asia Cup with 9 wickets at 23.59.
After losing the 2014 Test series by 3–1 against England, India won the ODI series by 3–1 in which Shami took 8 wickets at 24.16. In 5th ODI he bowled a good spell in the death overs, with tight line and length and middle-stump yorkers. After the match, cricket pundits called him the future of Indian bowling.
Shami took 10 wickets at 17.40 against West Indies in October 2014. In the 2nd ODI of the series he got his best bowling figure in ODIs as he picked up 4 wickets for 36 runs in his 9.3 overs.
He was in the 15-man squad for 5 ODIs against Sri Lanka in November 2014, but he was replaced by Dhawal Kulkarni due to a toe injury he suffered during the West Indies series.
For his performances in 2014, he was named in the World ODI XI by the ICC. Hat-trick in World Cup – has taken a hat-trick in the ICC Cricket World Cup, making him one of the few Indian bowlers to achieve this feat. Key role in ICC tournaments – His performance in the 2015, 2019, and 2023 Cricket World Cups has been exceptional.