
Ollie Pope is set to captain the England cricket team for the upcoming Test series at home against Sri Lanka. This came after England’s regular Test captain Ben Stokes was ruled out due to an injury.
Test Career of Ollie Pope
Pope made his Test debut on August 9, 2018 against India. He has so far played 46 Test matches and scored 2690 runs from 81 innings, averaging at 35.39 at a strike rate of 62.79. He has smashed six Test centuries and 13 fifties. His highest individual score in Test is 205. Pope holds the record for most catches by a substitute in a match (4) in a match against Australia in Sydney on January 5, 2022.
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How It Began
Ollie Pope began playing cricket in his school days and played club cricket for Guildford and Cranleigh Cricket Clubs and was a member of the Surrey age-group sides.
He made his List A debut for Surrey in the semi-final of the 2016 Royal London One-Day Cup against Yorkshire On 28 August 2016.
He made his first-class debut on 28 March 2017 for Surrey against Oxford MCCU as part of the Marylebone Cricket Club University fixtures. He was selected for the England and Wales Cricket Board’s overseas placement programme in Australia and played for the Campbelltown-Camden District Cricket Club in the NSW Premier Cricket League. In his campaign there, Pope went on to score 994 runs, including 3 centuries for which he received a commendation in the New South Wales parliament.
In 2018, he hit 4 centuries and averaged 70.42 runs in Surrey’s County Championship in a title-winning campaign and was subsequently awarded the PCA Young Player of the Year award.
Pope continued his successful run in 2019 becoming the highest run-getter for Surrey with 812 runs in nine innings at an average of 101, including 3 centuries.
Also Read: Who Is Alick Athanaze? Unraveling The West Indian Journey
The right-handed batter played for Surrey in the 2021 County Championship scoring 861 runs at an average of 78.27, including totals of 245 against Leicestershire and a career-best 274 against Glamorgan.
Ollie Pope is yet to make ODI debut for England.