Rajat Bhatia

Rajat Bhatia (born 22 October 1979) is an Indian former all-rounder cricketer. He has represented many teams, such as the Tamil Nadu cricket team and the Delhi cricket team and Delhi Daredevils, Kolkata Knight Riders and Rising Pune Supergiants in the IPL. He was a part of the MRF Pace Foundation when he was young.[1] He led the Uttarakhand cricket team in 2018 Ranji Trophy and Vijay Hazare Trophy.

Rajat Bhatia
Personal information
Full nameRajat Bhatia
Born (1979-10-22) 22 October 1979
Bangalore, Karnataka,India
BattingRight-handed
BowlingRight arm medium fast
RoleAll-rounder
Domestic team information
YearsTeam
1999/00-2005/06Tamil Nadu
2005/06–2015Delhi
2008–2010Delhi Daredevils
2011–2013Kolkata Knight Riders
2014–2015Rajasthan Royals
2016–2017Rising Pune Supergiants (squad no. 29)
2018-2020Uttarakhand
Career statistics
Competition FC LA T20
Matches 112 119 146
Runs scored 6,482 3,038 1,251
Batting average 49.10 41.05 21.56
100s/50s 17/30 3/19 1/1
Top score 212* 106* 107*
Balls bowled 9,989 3,931 2,520
Wickets 137 93 111
Bowling average 27.97 31.66 27.20
5 wickets in innings 1 1 0
10 wickets in match 0 0 0
Best bowling 5/29 5/17 4/15
Catches/stumpings 41/- 45/- 46/-
Source: Cricinfo, 29 July 2020

In 2011, he played a major role in Kolkata Knight Riders getting into the top four and qualify for the Champions League Twenty20 for the first time and also won the Newport League.[2]

In July 2020, Bhatia announced his retirement from all forms of cricket.[3][4]

Career

Bhatia has played four Under-19 Limited Overs Matches. He scored 152 runs at 50.67, including a century (109 runs is his top score here). Bhatia has taken 8 wickets here.

He has played domestic cricket for 21 years now, making his first-class debut for Tamil Nadu cricket team against Sinhalese Sports Club, at Colombo, in 2000, and he also made his List A debut for the same team against the same team in the same year. Despite that, he was hardly known out of the Indian domestic circuit.

In the 2007-08 Ranji Trophy Season, he contributed much to Delhi's title win with 512 runs in 7 matches.

The same year, he made his Twenty20 debut for Delhi against Himachal Pradesh in the Inter-State T20 Championship, North Zone game on 3 April 2007, at Delhi where he run out Himachal Pradesh skipper Sandeep Sharma and scored 3 off 7 balls. Himachal Pradesh won by 7 wickets with 1 over spare.[5]

He first played for Tamil Nadu, but later returned to his original state, the Delhi cricket team. He represented Delhi Daredevils in the inaugural IPL. In 2010 IPL, he took nine wickets to 9 matches, which was a very impressive display.

He was quite unfortunate not to be on the selectors' radars. He was instrumental in Delhi's Ranji Trophy title win in 2007, thanks to his 512 runs in 7 matches. He has been very successful in his first-class career, taking 76 wickets at 29.21, and has also scored nearly 4000 runs at an average of nearly 50, scoring the runs mostly at crucial times when his team needed them the most. In 2010 IPL, he took nine wickets in nine matches for his team, Delhi Daredevils. In 2011, he was bought by the Kolkata Knight Riders, who had decided to entirely revamp their team. Bhatia played a key role as for the first time, KKR finished amongst the top teams after the halfway of the group stage and eventually finished in the top four, which led to their qualification for the 2011 Champions League Twenty20 qualifying rounds. Again, Bhatia performed with both bat and ball, to take KKR to the main round, where he took 2/27 in 3.4 overs and was the best bowler. Nevertheless, Somerset won by 5 wickets in the penultimate ball of the innings.[6]

He was bought by Rajasthan Royals at the 2014 IPL auction for Rs.1.7 crore. He was bought for INR 6 million in the VIVO IPL Auction – 9 and will be playing for the Rising Pune Supergiants.

In November 2015, Bhatia was let go by the Delhi cricket team after playing 81 matches which he scored 4666 runs and taking 96 wickets and then he joined the Rajasthan cricket team rest of the season.[7][8][9]

After being released by KKR, he was bought by Rajasthan Royals for a whopping amount. He picked up 12 wickets in that season.

Bhatia also played a couple of seasons for Rising Pune Supergiants. His last appearance in IPL was in 2017[10]

Ahead of the 2018–19 Ranji Trophy, he transferred from Rajasthan to Uttarakhand.[11] He was the leading run-scorer for Uttarakhand in the group-stage of the 2018–19 Ranji Trophy, with 700 runs in eight matches.[12]

References
  1. Biography Cricinfo. 8 October 2011.
  2. Delhi Daredevils Profile – Rajat Bhatia Archived 16 January 2010 at the Wayback Machine Delhi Daredevils.com. Retrieved 26 September 2011.
  3. "Rajat Bhatia announces retirement from all forms of cricket". ESPN Cricinfo. Retrieved 29 July 2020.
  4. "Slow, slower, Rajat Bhatia| Retirement | KKR | IPL | Delhi | RR | Tamil Nadu". Penbugs. 29 July 2020. Retrieved 24 September 2020.
  5. North Zone: Delhi vs Himachal Pradesh at Delhi, 3 Apr 2007 Scorecard Cricinfo. Retrieved 27 October 2011.
  6. Kolkata Knight Riders vs Somerset at Hyderabad (Deccan), 25 Sep 2011 Scorecard Cricinfo. Retrieved 28 October 2011.
  7. Ishant left out of Delhi Ranji squad
  8. Have not seen a worse time than this – Bhatia
  9. Rajasthan bank on Bhatia to revive campaign
  10. [12] (29 July 2020). "Rajat Bhatia retires from all forms of cricket | Delhi | KKR | RR". Penbugs. Retrieved 24 September 2020.CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  11. "List of domestic transfers ahead of the 2018-19 Ranji Trophy season". ESPN Cricinfo. Retrieved 31 October 2018.
  12. "From irresistible Rajasthan to inconsistent Karnataka". ESPN Cricinfo. Retrieved 15 January 2019.
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