The left-hand batsman, Suresh Raina, has played 226 ODIs, 78 T20Is and 18 Test matches for India scoring 7,988 runs, seven centuries and 48 half-centuries. Additionally, he is the top-rated run-getter of Indian T20 fantasy cricket league games and has won three T20 league trophies with Chennai team.
An online fantasy cricket team can do very well if it picks Raina and he is in his performance.
Let’s take a look why would we prefer him in fantasy cricket India team of 11wickets.com . Read on:
Kashmiri roots
Suresh Raina’s father Trilok Chand comes from Rainawari in Jammu and Kashmir. His mother, is right from Dharamsala, Himachal Pradesh. Nevertheless, his family settled down in Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh. Raina is one of five siblings while he has three elder brothers named, Dinesh, Mukesh and Naresh. He has one sister named Renu.
The UP sports hostel setup
Being a teenager, Raina needed to leave Ghaziabad and go on to Lucknow, the capital city of Uttar Pradesh, to enlist at one of the state’s sports hostels. From moving there in 1999, Raina labored his way up the age groups. As per the rules, he was permitted to keep his room in the hostel for about seven years. It had been only in 2006, when he was already an India player, that Raina emptied out it.
At 16, an India Under-19 debut
Raina was 16 when he was initially picked to represent India Under-19s on a tour to England. In the first match, he secured 72 runs in an informal four-day ‘Test’ for a team led by Manvinder Bisla and presenting Ambati Rayudu and Irfan Pathan, his future India teammates. Tim Bresnan was a leading face in that England team.
A duck on India debut
Referred to the senior Indian team at the age of 18 following his achievement in domestic cricket and for representing Indian sides, Raina’s international debut was not a day to recollect. Against Sri Lanka at Dambulla on July 30, 2005, the left-hand batsman was out at very first ball by the one and only Muttiah Muralitharan. Bagging a duck on ODI debut put him together with Sachin Tendulkar and Shikhar Dhawan.
The IPL superstar
Raina has really been the ruler of the Indian Premier League (IPL). Contracted with the Chennai Super Kings ever since the beginning of the league – with the exception two seasons with Gujarat Lions when the franchis was revoked – Raina has been a T20 giant. He is CSK’s all-time best run-scorer with 4985 at 35.10, two hundreds and 34 fifties. Additionally to these numbers, Raina has 96 catches and 36 wickets for CSK. His run count of 4985 is also the most for any cricketer in the IPL.
India’s T20 giant
Raina’s achievement for CSK and India has placed him at the top of the list of the nation’s leading run-getters in T20 cricket. With 7929 runs in 280 career T20 innings, Raina is the top scorer for India well before Virat Kohli who has 7809 from 236 innings. He and Kohli have four T20 hundreds each.
Youngest to lead India in T2oIs
Raina is the youngest cricketer to captain India in T20 internationals. He captained India the first time when he was 23. He also tends to be the second oldest to lead India in ODIs, after Tendulkar.
Indian cricket’s first 1-2-3 hero
When Raina hit a 100 on Test debut against Sri Lanka in 2010, he had become the first Indian to have a century in every format of international cricket. Raina had struck his first ODI ton against Hong Kong in the Asia Cup 2008. His, and India’s, 1st T20I 100 came against South Africa in the 2010 ICC World T20 in the West Indies.
A proper finisher
In 55 excellent ODI run-chases for India when Raina has batted, the 32-year-old averages 66.60 at a strike-rate of 101.74 with two hundreds and 13 half-centuries. This average is behind Kohli (98.93), MS Dhoni (97.81) and Rayudu (116.60) and just Virender Sehwag has a better strike-rate (105.96)
A vocational chef
Raina loves cooking. He has revealed that during his earliest tour as a skipper of the Indian team, he had prepared food for the entire team besides Ashok Dinda.
Thanks for reading! Play fantasy sports and enjoy!
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