Ahmed Ghulam Image 1 Hyderabad 1952

Description

Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India born right-arm offbreak bowler Ghulam Ahmed played first class cricket for Hyderabad from 1939-40 to 1958-59, and played 22 Tests for India from 1948-49 to 1958-59 and with Vinoo Mankad and Subash Gupte, formed the first great Indian spin trio. . He toured England in 1952 and Pakistan in 1954-55. He captained India in one Test against New Zealand at Hyderabad in November 1955, which was drawn, and in two Tests against West Indies in December 1958, both of which India lost.

He was the leading bowler on the 1952 tour of England, taking 80 wickets in first class matches at 21.92, and 15 in the four Tests at 24.73. Wisden said he “had days when he looked in the highest world class, but on other occasions he lacked bite”. In the first innings of the First Test he bowled 63 overs and took 5 for 100. In the match against Oxford University he took 8 for 84 and 5 for 66.

In the First Test against Pakistan in 1952-53, the inaugural Test between the two neighbours, he took five wickets, and made 50 at number 11, putting on 109 for the tenth wicket with Hemu Adhikari, his only Test match half century, scoring 192 runs at 8.72 average in his Test career. He made 5 first class half centuries with a top score of 90.

In the Third Test against Australia in Calcutta in 1956-57 he took 7 for 49 and 3 for 81, his best Test innings and match figures. His best match and innings first class figures came in the match against Madras in the Ranji Trophy in 1947-48, when he took 5 for 28 and 9 for 53. When Holkar made 757 against Hyderabad in 1950-51 he had bowling figures of 92.3-21-245-4.

He managed the Indian team that toured Australia and New Zealand in 1967–68.

Vintage Cricketers was founded in July 2019. There may be more photographs of this cricketer in the Vintage Cricketers library, which are due to be loaded in due course. In the meantime, please send a message to us using the contact form at the bottom left of this page and we can arrange to prepare and publish all images of this cricketer if you have a particular interest in him.