Rahul Dravid

Rahul Dravid ( pronunciation; full name Rahul Sharad Dravid, born 11 January 1973) is a former Indian cricketer, who captained the national Test and One Day International (ODI) cricket teams. Born in a Marathi family, he started playing cricket at the age of 12 and later represented the state team at the under-15, under-17 and under-19 levels. Popularly nicknamed "The Wall", he has been described as one of the greatest batsmen in the history of cricket. He was named one of the best five cricketers of the year by Wisden Cricketers' Almanack in 2000 and received the Player of the Year and the Test Player of the Year awards at the inaugural ICC awards ceremony in 2004. In December 2011, he became the first non-Australian cricketer to address at the Bradman Oration in Canberra.

As of October 2012, Dravid is the third-highest run scorer in Test cricket, after Sachin Tendulkar and Ricky Ponting, and the third Indian cricketer to exceed 10,000 runs both in Tests and in ODIs. Wisden ranked him the third greatest Test batsman of all time, after Don Bradman and Tendulkar. As of April 2009, he is the only cricketer to score a century in all ten Test-playing countries. As of October 2012, he holds the record for the most number of catches taken by a player in Test cricket, with 210.

In August 2011, after receiving an unexpected call to play in the ODI series against England, Dravid declared his retirement from ODIs as well as Twenty20 International (T20I), and in March 2012, he announced his retirement from international and first-class cricket. He appeared in the 2012 Indian Premier League as captain of the Rajasthan Royals.

Rahul Dravid, along with Glenn McGrath were honoured during the seventh annual Bradman Awards function in Sydney on November 1, 2012.