Paul Collingwood

Country: England
Date of Birth: May 26, 1976
Place of Birth: Shotley Bridge,Co Durham
Batting Style: Right Handed
Bowling Style: Right-arm medium
Skill: Bowler
Teams Played: Delhi Daredevils, England

Batting Performance

	M	Inn	No	Runs	HS	100s	50s	Avg	SR
Tests	68	115	10	4259	206	10	20	40.56	46.45
ODI	197	181	37	5092	120*	5	26	35.36	76.99
T20s	35	33	2	583	79	0	3	18.81	127.02
IPL	8	7	2	203	75*	0	3	40.6	130.13

Bowling & Fielding Performance

	M	Overs	Runs	Mdns	Wkts	Avg	Best	Econ
Tests	68	317.3	1018	51	17	59.88	3/23	3.21
ODI	197	864.2	4294	14	111	38.68	6/31	4.97
T20s	35	37	329	0	16	20.56	4/22	8.89
IPL	8	14.5	101	0	5	20.2	2/19	6.97

Career Performance

	First Match	Last Match
Tests	December 2, 2003 v Sri Lanka at Galle International Stadium, Galle	January 3, 2011 v Australia at Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG), Sydney
ODIs	June 7, 2001 v Pakistan at Edgbaston, Birmingham	March 11, 2011 v Bangladesh at Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium, Chittagong
T20s	June 13, 2005 v Australia at The Rose Bowl, Southampton	January 14, 2011 v Australia at Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG), Melbourne
IPL	March 29, 2010 v Kolkata Knight Riders at Feroz Shah Kotla, Delhi	April 18, 2010 v Deccan Chargers at Feroz Shah Kotla, Delhi

Profile

Paul Collingwood is probably the best English batsman in the past couple of years. The Durham batsman didn't have the best of starts to his international career as he struggled to keep his place in the team. But good performances in the domestic circuit saw Collingwood fighting back into the English team. Since then, he never looked back on his career.

Being a natural athlete, Collingwood is unarguably the best English fielder ever. His natural stroke-play and ability to retain his wicket at the crease has made him the backbone of the England middle order. The right-hander is very handy with his dibbly-dobbly medium-pace deliveries and has the reputation of being a partnership-breaker. His double century in the 2006-07 Ashes series was deprived of praise because of the manner in which his team folded in the second innings and lost the Test and the series.

In the months that followed, he has managed to cement his place in the squad on account of some consistent scores and decent spells with the ball. He bats in the lower-middle order which may explain his 4 hundreds in more than 150 ODIs. He was named skipper of the ODI side but followed in the footsteps of Michael Vaughan by stepping down as skipper to concentrate on his form.

He often remains the unsung hero playing second fiddle to the England top-order and front-line bowlers in the team. Despite return to form, his chances of taking over as captain were hurt when Kevin Pietersen was named skipper in 2008. Andrew Strauss succeeded Pietersen's brief stint as Strauss returned to ODI cricket after two years, denying Collingwood the chance to lead the side in the fifty-over format. He, however, did take charge as captain for the ICC World Twenty20 2009 where he failed to lead the side past the Super Eight stage of the tournament.