Nasser Hussain

Nasser Hussain is an English cricket commentator and former player, born in Madras, India, on 28 March 1968, who captained the England cricket team between 1999 and 2003; his overall international career extended from 1990 to 2004. ^{1 2 3 4}

A pugnacious right-handed batsman, he scored over 30,000 runs from more than 650 matches across all first-class and List A cricket, including 62 centuries. His highest Test score of 207, in the first Test of the 1997 Ashes at Edgbaston, was described by Wisden as "touched by genius". He played 96 Test matches and 88 One Day Internationals, scored 5,764 Test runs and took 67 Test catches. ¹

This record is for the English cricketer Nasser Hussain, a different person from the Indian rugby union player of the same name and from the Bangladeshi cricketer Nasir Hossain. ¹

Hussain was born in Madras into a Muslim family. His father, Raza Jawad "Joe" Hussain, was a keen cricketer and field hockey player and a descendant of Muhammad Ali Khan Wallajah, the Nawab of Arcot in the second half of the eighteenth century; his mother Shireen (originally Patricia Price) is English. His father moved the family to England in 1975, and Hussain recalled in his 2005 autobiography that the family gave up a prosperous life in India so the children would benefit from the English education system; the family settled in Ilford. ¹

He was a talented leg-spin bowler as a child, selected for Essex Under-11s at eight and Essex Under-15s at twelve, then lost his bowling after a growth spurt at fifteen and switched to batting. He studied Natural Sciences at the University of Durham and graduated in 1989 with a BSc. ¹

He joined Essex in 1987 and was first selected for England on the back of 990 County Championship runs in 1989, though injury and poor form limited his early-1990s caps; he became a regular Test cricketer only in 1996, when he scored 128 against India and was named Player of the Match and Player of the Series. ¹

He succeeded Alec Stewart as captain in 1999 and led England in 45 Test matches until resigning in 2003. Under him England won four consecutive Test series and rose to third in the Test rankings, and Simon Barnes of The Times wrote that he was perhaps the finest captain to hold the office. He stepped down as one-day captain after the 2003 World Cup and as Test captain later in 2003, and in his final Test, in May 2004 against New Zealand at Lord's, he scored 103 not out and hit the winning runs. ¹

He joined the Sky Sports commentary team immediately on retiring and became one of its leading commentators. His autobiography Playing With Fire (2005) won Best Autobiography at the British Sports Book Awards; he received honorary life membership of the Marylebone Cricket Club in 2005 and an OBE, and has coached at New Hall School in Essex since 2010. ¹

The museum records only what is needed to understand his public work: Hussain has been married to Karen since 1993, and their two sons and daughter play cricket for a local club in Essex. ¹

His public significance lies in a captaincy credited with turning England from a habitually under-performing side into one of achievement, in his standing as England's first captain of mixed Indian and English descent, and in his long Sky commentary career. ¹

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