Sourav Ganguly | CAB |
Sourav Ganguly is the President of CAB. Image: Getty Images

Former Indian skipper Sourav Ganguly, one of the most successful skippers in Indian Cricket’s history, has turned 45 today. Known for his distinctive leadership qualities and top class batting, the left-handed batsman made his first Test appearance for India in 1996 against England at Lord’s and registered a brilliant hundred on debut.

Later, his playing style would become of the most aggressive in world cricket. His prominence grew after he took over the captaincy responsibilities and navigated the resurgence of Indian cricket which was hit by the match-fixing scandal.

Soon, he transformed India into a cricketing powerhouse, leading the side to the finals of the Knockout tournament in 2000 and winning the 2002 Champions Trophy (India and Sri Lanka were awarded the trophy as joint-winners because of rain washed out the final) and finishing as the runners-up in the 2003 Cricket World Cup.

His time at the skipper also saw India become an authoritative team. He also believed in the power of young emerging talents and was the reason the likes of Harbhajan Singh, Yuvraj Singh, Virender Sehwag, Mohammad Kaif, Zaheer Khan and even MS Dhoni got their first opportunities at the highest level.

He retired in 2007 as the most successful Indian skipper with 113 Test matches and 311 ODIs to his name scoring 7212 runs at an average and 11,363 runs respectively in each format.

Later, he engaged himself as an administrator and currently the busiest man in cricket administration.

He is currently the president of the Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB). He is also a member of the Cricket Advisory Committee (CAC) and also the chairman of the BCCI’s technical committee.

Apart from all these duties, he also dabbles with commentary and occasional on-air match analysis.

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