13 Interesting facts about Danish Kaneria

Former Pakistani leg-spinner, Danish Kaneria still holds the record of being the most successful spinner the country ever produced. The tall leggie had a quirky action and a very well disguised googly which paved way for his success at the highest level. A good bowler if not the best, he had the talent to achieve lot more than he eventually did.

1. Birth:

Danish Kaneria was born in Karachi, Sindh, Pakistan on 16 December 1980.

2. Nicknames:

He is playfully called by his nicknames of ‘Dani’ and ‘Nani-dani’.

3. Hindu origin:

Danish belongs to the Hindu community of Pakistan. He is only the second Hindu to represent Pakistan after wicketkeeper and his first cousin Anil Dalpat.

4. Test debut:

He made his debut in the year 2000 in the second Test against England in Faisalabad. He picked up 2 wickets in the first innings that of Marcus Trescothick and Alec Stewart.

5. ODI debut:

He got picked to play against Zimbabwe in the final ODI of the series in Sharjah. Unfortunately for him, though, he failed to pick up a wicket as he conceded 43 runs off the 7 overs he bowled.

6. Pakistan’s most successful spinner:

Just going by the statistics, Kaneria who has 261 Test scalps to his name, 25 more than the great Abdul Qadir, is the most successful spinner in Pakistan’s Test cricket history. However, the debate on who was more effective still rages on.

7. Fourth-highest wickets tally:

Danish Kaneria is fourth on the list of bowlers with most Test wickets for Pakistan, behind only the legends Wasim Akram, Waqar Younis and Imran Khan.

8. Five-wicket hauls:

Taking five wickets in an innings in itself is a commendable effort in cricket but to have done it 15 times is really exceptional. That’s exactly what Danish did in his career of 61 Tests.

9. Lucky England:

Danish Kaneria managed a five-wicket haul against every Test playing nation, barring only England.

10. Seven-fors:

Of the 15 five-wicket hauls Danish accomplished, four of them were remarkably seven-fors. These came against Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Australia and New Zealand.

11. Career best:

Kaneria’s most memorable performance has got to be the one against Bangladesh in Multan in 2001. In this match, he picked up 6 wickets in each inning to record his career best figures of 12/94. He was rightly adjudged the man of the match for this performance.

12. Spot-fixing scandal:

On 17 February 2012, Danish Kaneria’s name came up in the court during Mervyn Westfield’s hearing on spot-fixing allegations. Both of them were teammates at the time of the alleged approach. On June 2012, he was found guilty and was banned for life by the ECB. The PCB too abide by this decision and as a result, Kaneria hasn’t featured in a competitive match since then.

13. Career statistics:

Danish Kaneria picked up 261 wickets in the 61 Tests he played. He also got 15 ODI wickets during his short stint of 18 matches.

Written by Jishnu Battacharyya