Alpesh Ravilal Ramjani (born 24 September 1994) is an Indian-born

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

er who plays for the

Uganda national cricket team The Uganda national cricket team, nicknamed the Cricket Cranes, is the men's team that represents Uganda in international cricket. The team is organised by the Uganda Cricket Association, which has been an List of International Cricket Counci ...

Personal life

Ramjani was born on 24 September 1994 in

Mumbai Mumbai ( ; ), also known as Bombay ( ; its official name until 1995), is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra. Mumbai is the financial capital and the most populous city proper of India with an estimated population of 12 ...

, India. As a schoolboy he played alongside Shreyas Iyer,

Shivam Dube Shivam Dube (born 25 June 1993) is an Indian international cricketer who plays for Mumbai in domestic cricket and the Chennai Super Kings in the Indian Premier League (IPL). He is an all-rounder who bats left-handed and bowls right-arm at medium ...

and

Suryakumar Yadav Suryakumar Yadav (born 14 September 1990) is an Indian international cricketer. He is a right-handed middle-order batter. He represents the India national cricket team and captains the Twenty20 International side. He was part of the national ...

. He completed a Bachelor of Commerce at Rizvi College of Engineering in Mumbai.

Career

Ramjani moved to Uganda to play cricket after losing his job during the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

. He was invited to Uganda by Ugandan national team player

Dinesh Nakrani Dinesh Nakrani (born 21 September 1991) is an Indian-born cricketer who represents the Uganda cricket team. He is an all-rounder who bats left-handed and bowls left-arm medium pace. He made his international debut for Uganda in 2018, having prev ...

, a family friend. In September 2022, he was named in Uganda's squad for the

2022 ACA Africa T20 Cup The 2022 ACA Africa T20 Cup was a cricket tournament played in Benoni, Gauteng, South Africa. The finals tournament were originally scheduled to be held in September 2019, but were moved to March 2020, with the original host city being Nairobi, Ke ...

for the first time. He made his

Twenty20 International Twenty20 International (T20I) is a form of Twenty20 cricket, in which each team plays a single innings with a maximum of twenty overs. The matches are played between international teams recognized by the International Cricket Council (ICC). ...

debut in the tournament against

Botswana Botswana, officially the Republic of Botswana, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. Botswana is topographically flat, with approximately 70 percent of its territory part of the Kalahari Desert. It is bordered by South Africa to the sou ...

. In August 2023, Nakrani was named in national side's squad for the 2023 East Africa T20 Cup, in which he was the highest wicket-taker with 25 wickets in 12 matches. In November 2023, he was named in the Uganda's squad for the 2022–23 ICC Men's T20 World Cup Africa Qualifier Regional Final, which went on to qualify for the

2024 ICC Men's T20 World Cup The 2024 ICC Men's T20 World Cup was the ninth edition of the ICC Men's T20 World Cup, co-hosted by Cricket West Indies and USA Cricket from 1 to 29 June 2024. It was the first major ICC tournament to include matches played in the United ...

. He finished the tournament as the second highest wicket-taker with 12 wickets in 6 matches. Nakrani established a new record for the most T20I wicket-taker in a calendar year in 2023, finishing with 55 wickets. He was subsequently named in the ICC Men's T20I Team of the Year for 2023. In May 2024, he was named in Uganda's squad for their maiden World Cup appearance at

. He played his first match at the World Cup on 3 June 2024 against

Afghanistan Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. It is bordered by Pakistan to the Durand Line, east and south, Iran to the Afghanistan–Iran borde ...

References

1994 births Living people Expatriate sportspeople in Uganda Indian cricketers Cricketers from Mumbai Uganda Twenty20 International cricketers {{Uganda-cricket-bio-stub