Truly International
March 2, 2007
by Aparajith Ramnath
It is not unusual in cricket to find players representing a country different to that of their birth. Nor is it unprecedented to find players who’ve played for more than one country. A number of South Africans illustrate the point: Robin Smith and Allan Lamb, and more recently Kevin Pietersen, all of whom went over to England. John Traicos played for South Africa before they were banned from the international arena, and then for Zimbabwe in the 1992 World Cup, when in his forties. Kepler Wessels, of course, played Tests for both Australia and South Africa, famously scoring centuries on debut for each country.
The modern-day World Cup, with its profusion of teams, is a prime candidate to furnish more such examples. This year’s tournament in the Caribbean has its share.
The man who scored an important century in the recent tri-series in Australia in the course of a remarkable turnaround in England’s fortunes, Ed Joyce, was an important part of the Irish team until fairly recently. Ireland, on the other hand, goes to the World Cup for the first time, and is captained by Trent Johnston, who came over from Australia a few years ago.
Followers of Indian cricket from the early nineties will remember a certain opposition seam bowler, Andy Cummins, who used then to play for the West Indies. Wonder of wonders, he is at the World Cup this year: he will play for Canada.
Does anyone know of other such instances from this year’s World Cup?
March 4, 2007 at 5:07 pm
ashish bagai an indian is palying for canada. robin singh born in trinidad played for india
March 4, 2007 at 5:08 pm
ashish bagai an indian is palying for canada and robin singh born in trinidad played for india
March 9, 2007 at 4:16 pm
gavin hamilton played for scotland in WC 99 then played a test for England and now is back to scotland - tht must be a first!
March 11, 2007 at 1:25 am
Thanks for these instances! I wouldn’t be surprised if there were a few more, given the number of teams this time.
AR
June 13, 2007 at 5:38 am
There was this bloke JOhn Davison, scored a really quick century, for canada I think but he had played his initial years for victoria in aussie land
July 7, 2007 at 4:07 pm
Hate to be nitpicking, wessels did’nt score a century on debut for SA. He sored two fifties though and scored a century against india in what was his second test for SA. andrew hudson scored a cebtury on debut in the test that marked SA’s return to international test cricket.
July 7, 2007 at 4:08 pm
BTW do you remember nolan clarke. He played for barbados in the 70’s i guess and then played for the dutch in the 96 world cup.