OTD | India’s former all-rounder Manoj Prabhakar was born in 1963

Today, 15th April 2024, Former India all-rounder Manoj Prabhakar celebrates his 61st birthday. The man who not only represented India on the international stage but lived for the country by taking shots. The man who was a genuine allrounder has been forgotten by the Indians in just a few years.

Representing India in 39 Test matches was just the tip of the iceberg for Prabhakar’s career. From being the face of the Indian bowling lineup in the nineties to becoming famous for only the wrong reasons Manoj Prabhakar came a long way. Starting his Test career against England in his home ground Delhi, Prabhakar opened both bowling and batting for India.

He became the first Indian player to open both batting and bowling for India in 21 test matches. His amazing performance with bat and bowl established him as one of the biggest superstars of Indian cricket. In his 12-year-long career, Prabhakar played 130 ODI matches and scored 1858 runs along with 157 wickets to his name. In Test cricket, he scored 1600 runs and 96 wickets in 58 innings.

A career full of controversies!

Despite these iconic stats and performances, Manoj Prabhakar’s career was full of controversies. He was one of those players whose name was attached to the 1997 match-fixing scandal. He was accused of playing slow according to bookies. The utter humiliation came in 1996 when he was dismissed for a single-digit score and failed to get a wicket against Sri Lanka.

After his poor performance the team dropped him from the next game of the tournament which triggered him to retire immediately. One of his most controversial innings came against West Indies when he along with Nayan Mongia scored just 16 runs off the last nine overs. Their slow batting performance led India to lose the game which required only 63 runs in the last nine overs to win the game. When the media questioned his approach Prabhakar questioned back with whether India had ever scored 63 from the final 9 overs