Craig Evans

Craig Evans Biography

Craig Neil Evans is a former Zimbabwean cricketer and a Rugby Union player. He was born on 29th November 1969, at Salisbury (now Harare) in Zimbabwe. He played as an all-rounder, a right-hand batsman and a right-hand fast medium bowler.

He played as a fullback for the Zimbabwean rugby team. He was even a scratch golfer for a certain time-being.

Often found guilty of not taking his chances seriously, he soon faded into oblivion although making a extremely short but impactful revival late in the twilight of his career. An aggressive batsman, he developed the reputation of failing nine out of ten times but liable to play a devastating innings the tenth time round.

Background

Like other top cricketers from his country, he studied at the Ruzawi School and Falcon College. He featured regularly for the Ruzawi School team, and named his headmaster Bryan Curtis alongside his father, as his major influence.

He really stood out in his younger days as he was tall and well-built, and much quicker than his peers. While playing for Falcon College, he went on a tour to Australia, which was his first overseas experience.

Opportunities like that, hardly came by because of Zimbabwe’s comparative isolation in those days before the granting of the Test status and the reinstatement of South Africa, which affected his cricketing education and experience.

After leaving school, he joined the Old Georgians Sports Club. During the winter, he went overseas to play for the Lancashire club Widnes for six months. He averaged 60 with the bat, and took a handful of wickets, but found the English pitches too slow to his liking.

Debut

He made his debut in an ODI match against India on 25th October 1992 at Harare. It was a dismal performance by not just Evans, but the entire Zimbabwean team as they lost by 30 runs.

After that match he hardly got the opportunity to play for the national team until 1996.

Rise to Glory

He came into the fray on August 1996, with an aggressive, unbeaten 96 against Sri Lanka in the Singer World Series. Then a splendid performances against India in the Standard Bank One Day Series in January 1997 saw him cement his place in the ODI squad.

In the first match, he scored a quick 40 and picked up a wicket to help Zimbabwe tie the match. In the second match, he saw off a revised target of 171 due to rain, with a composed 43. He was presented the Player of the Match award as Zimbabwe won the match with 2 balls remaining.

Low Points

In 1994, he was unavoidably detained in court charged with a traffic offence while playing for Mashonaland Select XI against Northamptonshire, but was recommended as the last man in. He later helped Mashonaland win the match by six wickets as he scored 102 in 76 balls.

Retirement

Evans made a comeback to the national squad in 2003 after impressive performances in the domestic campaign and Logan Cup for Mashonaland.

However, he was dropped from the national setup despite performing well. Evans retired in 2003 itself, when he didn’t make the cut for the 2003 ICC Cricket World Cup squad.