Raza: The Pakistan-born cricketer who rules Zimbabwean hearts

SIKANDAR Raza, Zimbabwe's Pakistan-born cricketer, has been on a fairytale run since 2022. The 37-year-old has been nominated twice in succession for the ICC Twenty20 International Player of the Year award in addition to becoming the first player to score five consecutive T20 international (T20I) half-centuries.

Since January 2022, Raza has scored almost 2,500 runs, including four centuries in one-day internationals (ODIs) and T20Is at an average of more than 40. He has also taken 71 wickets in the same period.

Raza has almost single-handedly rekindled Zimbabwe's interest in cricket and is easily the most admired sportsperson in his adopted homeland, a country where football rules the roost. It is not just his numbers that sing his praise. The adoration of crowds at Zimbabwe's sold-out international cricket matches in the last two years is what completes the story.

“Monya”, a popular chant originally composed for a revered former captain of Zimbabwe's biggest football club, has now been turned into an anthem for Raza when he is on song.

The nickname for Dynamos FC's former captain Murape Murape is replaced by “Raza” when the special rendition reverberates around cricket stadiums in Harare or Bulawayo.

The rest of the lyrics of this simple tune remain the same, melodically declaring that their hero is not only wonderful – just like a delightful local brand of coffee creamer – but also so good it is like his whole body is coated in this tasty powdered milk that they just love so much.

The once shy part-time Pakistani cricketer is now proud to call himself a Zimbabwean. It is a place he has called home for the past two decades and he now leads the country in T20Is.

The all-rounder was born in Sialkot, a city renowned as Pakistan's sports goods manufacturing hub in the country's northeast and has fond memories of growing up there.

“My early life in Pakistan was studies, studies and studies,” Raza told Al Jazeera.

“Street cricket was a big part of my early life. We used to enjoy our street cricket with taped tennis ball and that's how cricket started for me.”

How an ‘ordinary player' became Zimbabwe's best

Raza moved from Pakistan to Zimbabwe in 2003 with his parents. He was soon off to Glasgow Caledonian University in Scotland, where he graduated with a bachelor's degree in software engineering.

Little would those singing his praise at the grounds know that Raza's talents might never have been savoured so earnestly had he not chosen to put his studies on hold for a career in cricket. He stumbled upon the sport and realised later that he was actually good at it.

“I didn't really think cricket would be my true calling because I only had one year, in 2009, to make up my mind,” Raza recalled.