India's Shikhar Dhawan celebrates as he reaches his century during the ICC Champions Trophy group B match against the West Indies at The Oval cricket ground
India's Shikhar Dhawan celebrates as he reaches his century during the ICC Champions Trophy group B match against the West Indies at The Oval cricket ground

Shikhar Dhawan, India opener, who is primarily known as ‘Gabbar’ in the cricketing circles, celebrates his 31st birthday on Monday.

Dhawan was born on December 5 in 1985 in the capital state. The southpaw is one of the players to have played junior cricket for Delhi and then went on make his mark in the U-19 before making it big in international cricket.

He made his debut in ODI cricket in 2010 against Australia but it was in 2013, when he really rose to the occasion. On his Test debut against Australia at Mohali, Shikhar Dhawan scored the fastest ever century on Test debut by a player as he plundered 187. But he was unfortunate to miss the next Test due to a thumb injury.

Dhawan then scored 363 runs at an average of 90.75 in the ICC Champions Trophy 2013, with two centuries and one half-century.  In 2015 World Cup played in Australia, Dhawan again emerged as the star of the Indian team as the left-handed opener hit 412 runs in eight meeting.

However, from past one year, he is going through a rough patch which has forced selectors to drop him from the squad. Still, we all know he has a lot of cricket left in him and he’ll bounce back soon.

Virender Sehwag, former Delhi teammate of Shikhar Dhawan, was the first one to deliver an absolute classic on ‘Gabbar’s’ birthday.

Despite playing for Delhi for almost 10 years, both of them never got a chance to play for India together. In fact, Dhawan was the one replaced Sehwag in the Test squad for the Australia series in 2013.