Brendan Taylor

Brendan Ross Murray Taylor is a professional Zimbabwean cricketer who plays for the Zimbabwe national cricket team. He is a right handed batsman and a right arm off break bowler. In the past Taylor has been bowling off-break deliveries successfully and this makes him a good all round player. However as he is the first choice wicket keeper of the country without Tatenda Taibu his bowling has been put on hold.

Although Taylor is young he is one of the most experienced players in the present Zimbabwe squad and is regarded as the best batsman in the team who has scored eleven half-centuries in one day internationals with a top score of 98.

In 2006 when Zimbabwe toured Bangladesh Taylor played a significant role in the 3rd One day International which was won by Zimbabwe. This was altogether a close game and Zimbabwe was in need of 5 runs off the last delivery to win the match. On the last ball while Mashrafe Mortaza was the bowler, Taylor successfully hit a sixer and consequently Zimbabwe won the match and Taylor contributed his bit to the series win.

In the 2007 ICC World Cup Taylor scored 87 runs in three matches with an average of 29. After this, Taylor opted to visit Holland where he intended to play club cricket. However prior to his departure the Zimbabwe Cricket Board had announced that if any player left the country to play club cricket would not be selected.

In the Twenty20 ICC World cup Taylor was responsible for a classic stumping due to which Andrew Symonds had to depart. He also dismissed Mitchell Johnson by a vital run out when there was only a single stump to aim at.

As of June 2008, Taylor joined the Lashings World XI based in England. This was seen as somewhat controversial as claims of tension between Taylor and Zimbabwe Cricket Board, due to the board policy of denying players to play abroad.

Major achievements

5th highest scorer against in ODI series against South Africa, with 105 runs at 35.00