Shoaib Malik is a Pakistani cricketer and the former captain
of the Pakistan national cricket team. He plays for the Peshawar Zalmi
franchise in the Pakistan Super League (PSL). Malik was the captain of the
Pakistan national cricket team from 2007 to 2009.
Born on February 1, 1982, in Sialkot, Punjab, Pakistan,
Malik attended Imran Khan’s coaching clinic as a child. He tried out for the
U-15 World Cup squad in 1996 and was selected for his bowling. He made his
One-Day International debut in 1999 against the West Indies and his Test debut
in 2001 against Bangladesh.
Malik’s bowling action was inspected by PCB in 2001 and he
was advised to not bowl his doosra delivery. Malik has over 150 ODI wickets in
his kitty and has batted with a mid 30s average in both Test and ODI cricket.
He has had elbow surgery to correct his bowling action. Malik was ranked
second, behind teammate Shahid Afridi, in the ICC ODI all-rounder rankings in
June 2008. He was banned from playing international cricket for a period of one year from the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) in March 2010 although the ban
was overturned two months later. Malik became the highest run-scorer in T20I
for Pakistan in September 2017. On 1 July 2018, Malik also became the first
Asian batsman to score 2,000 runs in T20Is, and third overall. He is also the first player in the world to
play 100 T20Is.
He became the fourth batsman to score 8,000 runs in T20s in
August 2018. He announced his retirement from ODI cricket in July 2019, following
Pakistan’s last match in the 2019 Cricket World Cup.
On 10 October 2020, in the 2020–21 National T20 Cup, Shoaib
Malik became the first Pakistani batsman to score 10,000 runs in Twenty20
cricket, doing so in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s match against Balochistan.