Akshay Karnewar Wiki, Height, Age, Wife, Family, Biography & More

Akshay Karnewar is an ambidextrous cricketer who plays for the Vidarbha team in the domestic circuit. He represents his side in the first-class and List-A games. He also plays Twenty20 and rose to fame with his record feat of bowling his full quota of four overs without conceding any run and taking two wickets.

Wiki/Biography

Akshay Karnewar was born on Monday, 12 October 1992 (age 29 years; as of 2021) in Wagholi, Maharashtra. His zodiac sign is Libra. He started playing cricket at the age of six and at the age of 13, he was spotted by his coach Balu Navghare who suggested him to go for left-arm spin bowling instead of right-arm. A few years later, he played DY Patil T20 league in Mumbai and then gave trials for the Rajasthan Royals team where he didn’t get selected.

Gradually, in December 2015, he featured in List-A cricket and later first-class cricket for the Vidarbha team. In 2016, he was bought by Royal Challengers Bangalore in IPL for INR 10 Lakh.

Physical Appearance

Height (approx.): 5′ 9″

Hair Colour: Natural Black

Eye Colour: Dark Brown

Family

Akshay Karnewar belongs to a Maharashtrian family.

Parents & Siblings

His father’s name is Kishan Karnewar and he is a retired driver from Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation.

Wife

Address

Nagpur, Maharashtra

Career

He played his first major tournament on 10 December 2015 in a List-A game for Vidarbha against the Odisha team in Vijay Hazare Trophy. He not only impressed the critics with his two wickets but also scored 72 valuable runs. He ended up being the leading wicket-taker for Vidarbha (16) in that tournament. After that series, he took seven wickets in nine games at Syed Mushtaq Ali T20 (SMAT) tournament. His next debut match was a Twenty20 game against Gujarat on 3 January 2016 at the Vidarbha Cricket Stadium in Nagpur (Maharashtra). Gujarat was batting first and posted 174 runs on the board. In reply, Vidarbha could only score 114 runs and lost the match by 60 runs. Akshay was on the expensive side in two overs where he conceded 26 runs for no wicket. Soon, on 27 October 2016, he made his first-class debut against Jharkhand in a Ranji Trophy game. In this match, he took two wickets and scored 39 runs. His first five-wicket haul was against the Punjab team in the 2017-18 Ranji season. He then played a warm-up game against Australia for the Board’s President XI in the same year where took one wicket of Travis Head while conceding 59 runs in six overs.

His first century in domestic cricket came against the Rest Of India (ROI) team in the Irani Trophy on 14 February 2019 which helped his team to bag the coveted title for the consecutive second time.

Akshay Karnewar of Vidarbha is a rare cricketer ,who bowls left arm & right arm with the same action

During Vidarbha & Rest of India match in which Akshay was declared Man of Match

Classic!! pic.twitter.com/DbJEnRJy7q

— Nigel D’Souza (@Nigel__DSouza) February 21, 2019

Historic Twenty20 Spell

On 8 November 2021, he entered the record books with his maiden spell of the full quota of four overs in a Syed Mushtaq Ali match against Manipur. Vidarbha with the help of Jitesh Sharma and Apoorv Wankhede knocks posted 222 runs on the board. Manipur on the other hand was looking off the track during the whole chase and finished with 55 runs in 17 overs. Akshay was actually taken off the bowling after bowling three consecutive maidens. When he returned, he notched six dot deliveries and completed his spell of four-overs with zero runs for two wickets. This is the first-ever full quota of T20 spell where the bowler didn’t concede any run in Men’s cricket.

He spoke to the media after that,

“It’s unbelievable. Not conceding even a single run in the entire match is something extraordinary and I am really feeling good.”

Former Vidarbha coach Sulakshan Kulkarni praised his efforts by saying that,

“He is a big performance player. He showed his mettle with the bat in Vidarbha’s second Ranji final. Then, scored 100 in Irani Trophy and now recorded another big performance.”

The new chapter in his record books was awaiting the next day as well when he took hattrick against Sikkim in the last two balls of the eighth over and first ball of the tenth over. Vidarbha had posted 205 runs on the board. Sikkim could only score 75 runs in 20-overs after losing eight wickets. Akshay completed his spell with five runs in four overs and taking four wickets. Interestingly, two out of those dismissals were caught by the bowler and one hit-wicket. Ajit Karthik, captain Kranthi Kumar, wicketkeeper Ashish Thapa, and Nilesh Lamichaney were his victims.

Favourite

Facts/Trivia

• Speaking in an interview with a local news channel, he told about his journey to ambidextrous bowling by saying that,
  

  “When I was 13, my coach Balu Navghare asked me if I can bowl with my left arm. Since then I have been using both my arms. My intent is always to pick up wickets. I first watch how the batsmen is playing and then decide if I have to really use both my arms to take his wicket. Sometimes, I don’t need to.”

  He also said,

  “I bowl normally off-spin. My coach told me to bowl with my left hand. Due to the lack of a left-arm spinner in the team, I bowled a lot and was successful. But now I can bowl with both hands. Not only this, I can do many things with both hands.”

• His bowling in a warm-up against Australia impressed Australian all-rounder Marcus Stoinis so much that he remarked,
  

  “I actually didn’t know what the umpire was trying to tell me. He was trying to say ‘he’s going to bowl left arm to you’. So that’s brilliant by him. I’ve never seen that before.”