Ajay Ratra (born 13 December 1981) is a former Indian

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by st ...

er. He is a right-handed batsman and wicketkeeper. He made his ODI debut on Jan 19, 2002 against England. Ratra was selected in 2000 for the first intake of the National Cricket Academy in

Bangalore Bangalore (), officially Bengaluru (), is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Karnataka. It has a population of more than and a metropolitan population of around , making it the third most populous city and fifth most ...

. When Ratra made an innings of 115 not out in 2002 against the

West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Great ...

, he was the youngest wicketkeeper to make a century in Tests, and first Indian wicketkeeper to make an overseas century. After he was injured in 2002, he was replaced by Parthiv Patel, the youngest ever Test wicketkeeper. Ratra then fell behind

Mahendra Singh Dhoni Mahendra Singh Dhoni (; born 7 July 1981) is an Indian former international cricketer who was captain of the Indian national cricket team in limited-overs formats from 2007 to 2017 and in Test cricket from 2008 to 2014. He is also the curre ...

, Dinesh Karthik and Patel in the pecking order. Ratra was part of the Indian Under-19 squad which won the Youth World Cup in 2000, and following training sessions with the National Cricket Academy he became one of six wicketkeepers that India would attempt to integrate into the squad in the space of 12 months. He played in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy for the

Goa Goa () is a state on the southwestern coast of India within the Konkan region, geographically separated from the Deccan highlands by the Western Ghats. It is located between the Indian states of Maharashtra to the north and Karnataka to th ...

. In July 2015 Ratra announced his retirement from cricket. He played 99 first-class matches in which he scored 4029 runs at an average of 30.29 including eight hundreds and a double-century. He also played in 89 List A games in which scored 1381 runs at 22.63.

Career best performances

''as of 15 October 2010''

References

1981 births Living people India One Day International cricketers India Test cricketers Indian cricketers People from Faridabad Haryana cricketers Goa cricketers Himachal Pradesh cricketers Tripura cricketers North Zone cricketers Indian cricket coaches Cricketers from Haryana Wicket-keepers {{India-cricket-bio-1980s-stub