Rahul Dravid

Rahul Dravid is a former Indian cricketer and captain, widely regarded as one of the greatest batsmen in the history of cricket. Born in a Marathi family, he started playing cricket at the age of 12 and later represented the state team at the under-15, under-17 and under-19 levels. Hailed as The Wall, Dravid was named one of the best five cricketers of the year by Wisden Cricketers' Almanack in 2000 and received the Player of the Year and the Test Player of the Year awards at the inaugural ICC awards ceremony in 2004. In December 2011, he became the first non-Australian cricketer to deliver the Bradman Oration in Canberra.
As of October 2012, Dravid is the fourth-highest run scorer in Test cricket, after Sachin Tendulkar, Ricky Ponting and Jacques Kallis, and is only the second Indian cricketer, after Tendulkar to score 10,000 runs both in Tests and in ODIs. In 2004, after completing his century against Bangladesh in Chittagong, he became the first and the only player till date to score a century in all the ten Test-playing countries. As of October 2012, he holds the record for the most number of catches taken by a player (non-wicket-keeper) in Test cricket, with 210.
In August 2011, after receiving a surprise call in the ODI series against England, Dravid declared his retirement from ODIs as well as Twenty20 International (T20I), and in March 2012, he announced his retirement from international and first-class cricket. He appeared in the 2012 Indian Premier League as captain of the Rajasthan Royals.
Rahul Dravid, along with Glenn McGrath were honoured during the seventh annual Bradman Awards function in Sydney on 1 November 2012. Dravid has also been honoured with the Padma Bhushan award, India's third highest civilian award.
In 2014, Rahul Dravid joined the GoSports Foundation, Bangalore as a member of their board of advisors. In collaboration with GoSports Foundation he is mentoring India's future Olympians and Paralympians as part of the Rahul Dravid Athlete Mentorship Programme. Indian badmiton player Prannoy Kumar, Para-swimmer Sharath Gayakwad and young Golfer Chikkarangappa S. was part of the initial group of athletes to be mentored by Rahul Dravid.

Early life and introduction to cricket

Dravid was born in a Maharashtrian Deshastha Brahmin family in Indore, Madhya Pradesh. His family later moved to Bangalore, Karnataka, where he was raised. Dravid's father worked for a company that makes jams and preserves, giving rise to the later nickname Jammy. His mother, Pushpa, was a professor of Architecture at the University Visvesvaraya College of Engineering (UVCE), Bangalore. Dravid has a younger brother named Vijay. He did his schooling at St. Joseph's Boys High School, Bangalore and earned a degree in commerce from St. Joseph's College of Commerce, Bangalore. He was selected to India national cricket team while studying MBA in St Joseph’s College of Business Administration
Dravid started playing cricket at the age of 12, and represented Karnataka at the under-15, the under-17 and the under-19 levels. Former cricketer Keki Tarapore first noticed Dravid's talent while coaching at a summer camp in the Chinnaswamy Stadium. Dravid scored a century for his school team. He also played as wicket-keeper.
Dravid made his Ranji Trophy debut in February 1991, while he was still attending college. Playing alongside future Indian teammates Anil Kumble and Javagal Srinath against Maharashtra in Pune, he scored 82 runs in the match, which ended in a draw. His first full season was in 1991–92, when he scored two centuries and finished up with 380 runs at an average of 63.3, getting selected for the South Zone cricket team in the Duleep Trophy.

International career

Dravid made his international debut on 3 April 1996 in an ODI against Sri Lanka in the Singer Cup held in Singapore immediately after the 1996 World Cup replacing Vinod Kambli. He wasn't particularly impressive with the bat scoring just three runs before being dismissed by Muttiah Muralitharan but took two catches in the match. He followed it up with another failure in the next ODI of the series scoring just 4 runs before getting run out against Pakistan.
In contrast to his ODI debut, his Test debut was rather successful one. Dravid was selected for the Indian Test squad touring England on the backdrop of consistent heavy scoring in domestic cricket for 5 years, but didn't get a chance in the First Test despite scoring a fifty each against the Gloucestershire and the Leicestershire county in the tour games. He finally made his debut in Test cricket at Lord's on 20 June 1996 against England in the Second Test of the series. Dravid got the chance to be in the playing XI only because of the ankle injury to senior batsman Sanjay Manjrekar. Coming in to bat at no. 7, he forged important partnerships with another debutante Sourav Ganguly and his Karnataka team mates Kumble and Srinath securing a vital lead for his team in testing conditions. Batting for more than 6 hours, he scored 95 runs, missing out on a landmark debut hundred by just 5 runs, before getting out to the bowling of Chris Lewis. He also took his first catch in Test cricket in this match to dismiss Nasser Hussain off the bowling of Srinath. Dravid managed to hold on to his position in the playing XI in the Third Test despite Manjrekar's return. A hundred against British Universities in the tour game further strengthened Dravid's cause. Eventually Ajay Jadeja was dropped to accommodate Manjrekar in the team. Dravid went on to score 84 runs in the first innings of the Nottingham Test.