'Ramiz Hasan Raja (; born 14 August 1962) is a Pakistani cricket

sports commentator In Broadcasting of sports events, sports broadcasting, a sports commentator (also known as a sports announcer or sportscaster) provides a real time (media), real-time live commentary of a game or event, traditionally delivered in the present t ...

and former

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 served as the 36th Chairman of the

Pakistan Cricket Board The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), formerly known as Board of Control for Cricket in Pakistan (BCCP), is a sports governing body for cricket in Pakistan responsible for controlling and organising all tours and matches undertaken by the Pakistan ...

(PCB) from 2021 to 2022. He played international cricket for the

Pakistan national cricket team The Pakistan men's national cricket team represents Pakistan in international cricket. It is controlled by the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), the governing body for cricket in Pakistan, which is a Full Member of the International Cricket Counc ...

from 1984 to 1997, appearing in 57 Test matches and 198 One Day Internationals (ODIs), and was part of the team that won the

1992 Cricket World Cup The 1992 Cricket World Cup (known as the Benson & Hedges World Cup 1992 for sponsorship reasons) was the fifth Cricket World Cup, the premier One Day International cricket tournament for men's national teams, organised by the International Cric ...

. Raja was occasionally appointed captain and scored over 8,000 runs across formats during his international career. After retiring from professional cricket, he transitioned into commentary and analysis, becoming one of the most recognized voices in the cricketing world. He also hosts a popular

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

channel, ''Ramiz Speaks'', where he discusses cricket-related topics.

Early and personal life

Family background

Raja was born on 14 August 1962 in

Faisalabad Faisalabad, formerly known as Lyallpur, is the List of cities in Punjab, Pakistan by population, second-largest city and primary List of cities in Punjab, Pakistan by population, industrial center of the Pakistani province of Punjab, Pakistan ...

Punjab, Pakistan Punjab (, ) is a Administrative units of Pakistan, province of Pakistan. With a population of over 127 million, it is the Demographics of Pakistan, most populous province in Pakistan and the List of first-level administrative divisions by popu ...

. His family roots lie in

Jaipur Jaipur (; , ) is the List of state and union territory capitals in India, capital and the List of cities and towns in Rajasthan, largest city of the north-western States and union territories of India, Indian state of Rajasthan. , the city had ...

, Rajasthan, India. His father Saleem Akhtar was a cricketer during the British colonial era who played for

Multan Multan is the List of cities in Punjab, Pakistan by population, fifth-most populous city in the Punjab, Pakistan, Punjab province of Pakistan. Located along the eastern bank of the Chenab River, it is the List of cities in Pakistan by populatio ...

and

Sargodha Sargodha (Punjabi language, Punjabi/; ; ) is a city and capital of Sargodha Division, located in Central Punjab, central Punjab, Pakistan, Punjab, Pakistan. It is Pakistan's List of most populous cities in Pakistan, 11th most populous city and ...

after the partition, while his brother Wasim Raja and cousin Atif Rauf played for the

, with another brother Zaeem Raja having played first-class cricket as well.

Education

Raja is an alumnus of

Sadiq Public School The Sadiq Public School (SPS) is a college-preparatory boarding school located in Bahawalpur, Punjab, Pakistan. It also takes day pupils. It is one of the largest schools in Pakistan and its area of makes it both the largest in the country and ...

Bahawalpur Bahawalpur (Urdu: ; ) is a city in Punjab, Pakistan. It is the 13th largest city of Pakistan and List of cities in Punjab, Pakistan by population, 8th most populous city of Punjab. Bahawalpur is the capital of Bahawalpur Division. Founded in ...

, Aitchison College, Lahore and

Government College University, Lahore The Government College University (colloquially known as GCU; Punjabi, Urdu: ) is a public research university in Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan. Founded as Government College, Lahore, in 1864 under British administration, it became a university i ...

Marriage

Raja is married two times. His wife's parents had roots in British India; his mother-in-law hailed from

Delhi Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, but spread chiefly to the west, or beyond its Bank (geography ...

and his father-in-law from

Karnal Karnal () is a city located in the state of Haryana, India and is the administrative headquarters of Karnal District. The city is well connected as it lies on National Highway 01, in the south of the city lies the cities of Panipat and Sonipa ...

Haryana Haryana () is a States and union territories of India, state located in the northern part of India. It was carved out after the linguistic reorganisation of Punjab, India, Punjab on 1 November 1966. It is ranked 21st in terms of area, with les ...

.Inzamam-ul-Haq
28 May 1997, ''

Outlook India ''Outlook'' is a weekly general interest English and Hindi news magazine published in India. History and profile ''Outlook'' was first issued in October 1995 with Vinod Mehta as the editor in chief. It is owned by the Rajan Raheja Group. Th ...

''. Archived from th
original
on 13 June 2024. "His captain ''Rameez Raja,'' too, wanted to visit his inlaws' relatives in Kamal, his own folks in Jaipur. "I'm from Lahore. My mother-in-law is from Delhi, my father-in-law from Karnal. Don't know about the wife. I've hopefully picked up some of Delhi's famous ''tehzeeb'' (courtesy) from her," he says, smiling shyly."

Rajasthani architecture

An admirer of Rajasthani architecture, he asked Pakistani architect

Nayyar Ali Dada Nayyar Ali Dada () (born 'Syed Nayyar Ali Zaidi''; 11 November 1943) is a Pakistani architect.

to design his Lahore house on the pattern of Jaipur's

Rambagh Palace The Rambagh Palace in Jaipur, Rajasthan is the former residence of the Maharaja of Jaipur located outside the walls of the city of Jaipur on Bhawani Singh Road. History The first building on the site was a garden house built in 1835 for th ...

Domestic career

Raja made his

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 of three or more days scheduled duration between two sides of eleven players each and is officially adju ...

debut in 1978, scoring over 9,000 runs in List A and 10,000 runs in first class matches. He made his Test debut against England in 1984 and ODI debut against New Zealand in 1985. Raja was regarded as one of the prominent batters playing in Pakistan's domestic cricket.

International career

Golden years

When he got his first opportunity to play in a Test match, against

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

, Raja's performance was unimpressive, as he was dismissed for 1 run in each

innings An innings is one of the divisions of a cricket match during which one team takes its turn to bat. Innings also means the period in which an individual player bats (acts as either striker or nonstriker). In cricket and rounders, "innings" is ...

. However, with the retirement of several players in the Pakistan squad and with the help of his years of experience in

, Raja was able to secure a spot in the national side. He played international

for 13 years, appearing in 57 Test matches, with a career average of 31.83 and scoring two centuries. In the

One Day International One Day International (ODI) is a format of cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of fifty overs, with the game lasting up to 7 hours. The World Cup, generally held every four yea ...

arena, he played 198 matches and scored 9 centuries. He was a member of the national side that reached the semi-finals of the 1987 World Cup. He scored 2 centuries in the 1992 World Cup, which was held in Australia, including a century against

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

, who had been undefeated during that period. He was awarded the man of the match for his match winning performance which earned Pakistan a place in the semi-finals of the tournament. In the final against England, Raja had the honour of taking the final catch which won the

World Cup A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the name is ...

for Pakistan. This became the pinnacle of his cricketing career, as within a year of this triumph, he had lost form and was dropped from the national side.

Obstructing the field

Raja became the first player in

history to be given out "

obstructing the field Obstructing the field is one of the ten methods of dismissing a batsman in the sport of cricket. Either batsman can be given out if he wilfully attempts to obstruct or distract the fielding side by word or action. It is Law 37 of the Laws of ...

" against England, in a match at

Karachi Karachi is the capital city of the Administrative units of Pakistan, province of Sindh, Pakistan. It is the List of cities in Pakistan by population, largest city in Pakistan and 12th List of largest cities, largest in the world, with a popul ...

in 1987. England had scored 263 runs for 6 wickets during their 44 over innings. For Pakistan, Raja opened the batting and had reached 98 runs when the last ball of the match was bowled, with Pakistan needing 25 runs to win in the last over. During this last over, he hit the ball and sprinted for two runs that would have given him his century, but was well short of the crease when the fielder's return came towards him and Raja knocked the ball away with his bat and was given out for "obstructing the field".

Late career

He was recalled to the Pakistan squad and played in the

1996 Cricket World Cup The 1996 Cricket World Cup, also called the Wills World Cup 1996 for sponsorship reasons, was the sixth Cricket World Cup organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC). It was co-hosted by India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The tournament wa ...

. During the 1995–1996 season, he was removed from the captaincy, after Pakistan lost their first home series to

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, also known historically as Ceylon, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, separated from the Indian subcontinent, ...

. His final game in a Test match for Pakistan was as captain in the 1996–1997 tour of Sri Lanka, however the team failed to win a match during the series. He retired from all forms of cricket in 1997 and since then he has been active as a television commentator and analyst as an administrator for both Pakistan and international cricket.

Post-retirement

Commentary career

Raja has worked as a commentator on ''

Test Match Special ''Test Match Special'' (also known as ''TMS'') is a British sports radio programme, originally, as its name implies, dealing exclusively with Test cricket matches, but currently covering any professional cricket. The programme is available on BB ...

'' and

Sky Sports Sky Sports is a group of British broadcasting of sports events, subscription sports channels operated by the satellite television, satellite pay television company Sky Group (a division of Comcast), and is the dominant subscription television ...

, during the 2006 England Test series against Pakistan. He has also worked as the chief executive of the

, but resigned from his job in August 2004, citing increasing media commitments. He continues to provide commentary on Pakistan cricket team's tours as well as in many domestic tournaments and international ICC tournaments.

Cricket administration

Raja served as the 35th Chairman of the

between September 2021 and December 2022.

Hosting

In 2024, Raja launched ''Showtime With Ramiz Raja'' on Suno News, a late-night entertainment show where he interviews celebrities.

References

External links

*
Ramiz Raja
on

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Raja, Ramiz 1962 births Living people Allied Bank Limited cricketers Islamabad cricketers Cricketers from Faisalabad Aitchison College alumni Pakistan Cricket Board Presidents and Chairmen Pakistan National Shipping Corporation cricketers Pakistan One Day International cricketers Pakistan Test cricketers Pakistan Test cricket captains Pakistani cricket captains Cricketers at the 1987 Cricket World Cup Cricketers at the 1992 Cricket World Cup Cricketers at the 1996 Cricket World Cup Pakistani cricket commentators Sadiq Public School alumni Service Industries cricketers Lahore City cricketers Lahore City A cricketers Lahore City Whites cricketers Punjab (Pakistan) cricketers St. Anthony's High School, Lahore alumni Government College University, Lahore alumni Pakistani YouTubers Central Model School, Lahore alumni Pakistani cricket administrators