|
India's Ajay Ratra began his Test career rather disastrously when he was out for a duck after playing just 7 balls in his debut Test innings against West Indies in the second Test at Port of Spain on 20.04.2002. He is the second wicket-keeper for India after J K Irani to be dismissed for a duck in the debut innings of a Test. Irani had his misfortune of a duck in his debut innings against Australia at Brisbane in 1947/48. Ratra became the 30th player to keep wickets for India including Vijay Manjrekar who had donned the role of a wicket-keeper by unforeseen circumstances against West Indies at Kingston in 1952/53. It is interesting to note that Manjrekar had notched up a century (43 & 118) while playing his first Test as wicket-keeper after making his debut against England earlier at Calcutta in 1951-52. Four other Indian wicket-keepers P G Joshi, K S Indrajitsinhji, Bharat Reddy and S Viswanath have all made ducks in the second innings of their debut Tests. Dilawar Hussain, who played three Tests for India, has the distinction of being the only wicket-keeper to score a fifty in his debut innings. In fact he scored fifty in each innings (59 & 57) on his debut against England at Calcutta in 1933-34. He had actually opened the innings along with Naoomal Jeoomal in the first innings and played at number seven in the 2nd innings. The dearth of quality wicket-keepers in the Indian team since its entry into test cricket in 1932 can be guazed from the fact that in the 353 Tests played so far (including the Port of Spain Test), S M H Kirmani happens to be the only wicket-keeper to have played more than 50 Tests. Apart from Kirmani, the other Indian wicket-keepers to have come near the 50 Test mark are K S More (49 Tests), Farooq M Engineer (46 Tests) and Nayan Mongia (44 Tests). The following is the complete list of players who have kept wickets for India in Tests: | Sl No | Wicket Keepers | Tests played as W/K | | 1 | Navle JG | 2 | | 2 | Dilawar Hussain | 3 | | 3 | Hindlekar DD | 4 | | 4 | Meher Homji KR | 1 | | 5 | Irani JK | 2 | | 6 | Sen P | 14 | | 7 | Joshi PG | 12 | | 8 | Mantri MK | 3 | | 9 | Rajindernath | 1 | | 10 | Maka ES | 2 | | 11 | Manjrekar VL | 1 | | 12 | Tamhane NS | 21 | | 13 | Patankar CT | 1 | | 14 | Kunderan BK | 15 | | 15 | Engineer FM | 46 | | 16 | Indrajitsinhji KS | 4 | | 17 | Krishnamurthy P | 5 | | 18 | Kirmani SMH | 88 | | 19 | Reddy B | 4 | | 20 | Viswanath S | 3 | | 21 | More KS | 49 | | 22 | Pandit CS | 3 | | 23 | Yadav V | 1 | | 24 | Mongia NR | 44 | | 25 | Prasad MSK | 6 | | 26 | Karim SS | 1 | | 27 | Dahiya V | 2 | | 28 | Dighe SS | 6 | | 29 | Das Gupta D | 8 | | 30 | Ratra A | 1 | | | Total | 353 Tests |
Extras:
Murray's achieves feat of 100 Test dismissals
Tendulkar's century and duck in same Test
| 
