Minal Mahesh Patel (born 7 July 1970) is a retired Indian-born English

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 who made two appearances in

Test cricket Test cricket is a form of first-class cricket played at international level between teams representing full member countries of the International Cricket Council (ICC). A match consists of four innings (two per team) and is scheduled to last f ...

for the

England cricket team The England cricket team represents England and Wales in international cricket. Since 1997, it has been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB), having been previously governed by Marylebone Cricket Club (the MCC) since 1903. Eng ...

. He was a right-handed

batsman In cricket, batting is the act or skill of hitting the ball with a bat to score runs and prevent the loss of one's wicket. Any player who is currently batting is, since September 2021, officially referred to as a batter (historically, th ...

and a slow left arm bowler, who primarily played for

Kent County Cricket Club Kent County Cricket Club is one of the eighteen first-class county clubs within the domestic cricket structure of England and Wales. It represents the historic county of Kent. A club representing the county was first founded in 1842 but Ke ...

. As of 2018 he is the Second XI coach at Kent. Born in

Bombay Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the '' de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the sec ...

(now called Mumbai), and educated in England at Dartford Grammar School and later Manchester Polytechnic, Patel's

first-class cricket First-class cricket, along with List A cricket and Twenty20 cricket, is one of the highest-standard forms of cricket. A first-class match is one of three or more days' scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officia ...

debut for Kent came at the end of the 1989 English cricket season, in a match against

Middlesex Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a historic county in southeast England. Its area is almost entirely within the wider urbanised area of London and mostly within the ceremonial county of Greater London, with small sections in neighbourin ...

. He became a regular in the Kent side over the following seasons, and in

1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which sank in the Baltic Sea; Nelson Ma ...

and

1995 File:1995 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: O.J. Simpson is acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman from the year prior in "The Trial of the Century" in the United States; The Great Hanshin earthquake strike ...

"took wickets for fun"; indeed in 1994 he was the leading wicket-taker in England with 90 at a

bowling average In cricket, a player's bowling average is the number of runs they have conceded per wicket taken. The lower the bowling average is, the better the bowler is performing. It is one of a number of statistics used to compare bowlers, commonly use ...

of 22.86. Pitches at Kent's home ground, the

St Lawrence Ground The St Lawrence Ground is a cricket ground in Canterbury, Kent. It is the home ground of Kent County Cricket Club and since 2013 has been known as The Spitfire Ground, St Lawrence, due to commercial sponsorship. It is one of the oldest grounds o ...

, began to be prepared specifically for the spin bowling of Patel and

Carl Hooper Carl Llewelyn Hooper (born 15 December 1966) is a former Guyanese cricketer who captained the West Indies in Tests and ODIs. An all-rounder, he was a right-handed batsman and off-spin bowler, who came to prominence in the late 1980s in a side t ...

, despite the home side also boasting a

seam Seam may refer to: Science and technology * Seam (geology), a stratum of coal or mineral that is economically viable; a bed or a distinct layer of vein of rock in other layers of rock * Seam (metallurgy), a metalworking process the joins the ends ...

attack of Alan Igglesden, Martin McCague, Dean Headley and Duncan Spencer. 1996 saw Patel make his Test debut against the country of his birth,

India India, officially the Republic of India ( Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the ...

. One of seven players to make their debut in the match at Edgbaston, Patel struggled to make an impact on a green wicket, only bowling ten overs in England's eight wicket win. Left out for the second Test at Lord's, he returned for the third Test at

Trent Bridge Trent Bridge Cricket Ground is a cricket ground mostly used for Test, One-Day International and county cricket located in West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire, England, just across the River Trent from the city of Nottingham. Trent Bridge is als ...

. Again, Patel struggled on a pitch not suited to spin bowling, however he managed to take his maiden (and last) Test wicket; that of

Sanjay Manjrekar Sanjay Vijay Manjrekar (born 12 July 1965) is an Indian cricket commentator and former cricketer. He played international cricket for India from 1987 until 1996 as a right-handed middle order batsman. Domestic career Manjrekar was born in Man ...

, caught by

Graeme Hick Graeme Ashley Hick (born 23 May 1966) is a Zimbabwean-born former England cricketer who played 65 Test matches and 120 One Day Internationals for England. He was born in Rhodesia, and as a young man played international cricket for Zimbabwe. H ...

. Patel's career looked to be in jeopardy during 1997, when a combination of injuries sustained while teaching PE and whilst batting for his club side ruled him out for most of the season. He returned the following season, and performed consistently for them through the following eight seasons. Patel joined Central Districts for one season over the winter of 2005/2006, where he proved a useful asset in the side's

State Championship New Zealand has had a domestic first-class cricket championship since the 1906–07 season. Since the 2009–10 season it has been known by its original name of the Plunket Shield. History The Plunket Shield competition was instigated in Octob ...

victory, taking six wickets in the final. This came after he had been mentioned in relation to a possible recall to the England squad as cover for

Ashley Giles Ashley Fraser Giles (born 19 March 1973) is a former English first-class cricketer, who played 54 Test matches and 62 One Day Internationals for England before being forced to retire due to a recurring hip injury. Giles played the entirety of ...

on the tour of Pakistan. Following a recurring elbow injury, he announced his retirement from first-class cricket at the start of the 2008 season.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Patel, Min 1970 births English cricketers England Test cricketers Central Districts cricketers Kent cricketers Alumni of Manchester Metropolitan University Living people People educated at Dartford Grammar School Marylebone Cricket Club cricketers Indian emigrants to England British sportspeople of Indian descent British Asian cricketers First-Class Counties Select XI cricketers Cricketers from Mumbai