Interesting facts about Sir Ian Botham

Sir Ian Botham is a former allrounder who played for England. He is one of Britain’s most famous cricket players. Check out some interesting facts about the great allrounder

Interesting facts about Ian Botham

# He was born on 24th November 1955 in Oldfield, Heswall, Cheshire, England. His full name was Ian Terence Botham.

# Nick Names - Beefy and Guy the Gorilla

# He played for 3 English counties - Durham, Worchestershire, Somerset.

# He was the first player to score a century (114) and took 10 wickets (6/58 & 7/48) in a test match. He did this in a Golden Jubilee Test against India in 1980.

# He do a lot of charity walks. During an injury, he was hospitalized. While in the hospital, he once went through the children's ward and found few kids who were playing a board game. On asking, he was told that all of them were suffering from leukaemia and few of them were in last stage. He was then told there was lack of funds for the annual party that for some was their last. Since then, ​Botham organised and participated in long distance walks to raise money forhis organisationleukemia research.

# Though he performed many times for England but 1981 Ashes was something special. He helped his team to register 3-1 victory over rivals Australia. He was awarded man of the series for his brilliant allround performance (399 runs and 34 wickets). His dominance in the series was such that the series is still remembered as Botham's Ashes.

# On 5 occasions, ​he scored a century and took 5 wickets in an innings in the same Test match.

​# He was also a very good footballer. He even played for Scunthorpe as a centre-forward. He also played for Yeovil Town. He made 11 appearances in The Football League.

​# Awards:

• ​1978 - ​Wisden cricketer of the year 
• ​1981 - ​BBC Sports Personality of the Year 
• ​1988 - Awarded Pipe Smoker of the Year 
• ​1992 - Appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire for cricket and charity work
• 2004 - ​BBC Sports Personality of the Year Lifetime Achievement Award 

# ​In 102 Test Matches for England he scored 5200 runs, including 14 centuries, and took 383 wickets. In 116 One-Day Internationals, he scored 2113 runs took 145 wickets.

# ​He is a close friend of Sir Viv Richards since his early days. The two bond very well. In 1986, he even resigned from Somerset, in protest against the sacking of Vivian Richards from the team.

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Sahir