Shoaib Akhtar
Pakistani cricketer
Shoaib Akhtar (born 13 August 1975) is a Pakistani former international cricketer and commentator. Nicknamed the "Rawalpindi Express", he is the fastest bowler in cricketing history.
Akhtar made his Test match debut in November 1997 as an opening fast bowler and played his first One Day International three months later. Post-retirement, he began a YouTube career by starting his own channel, where he gives reviews on International and league matches and Pakistani cricket.
Early and personal life
Akhtar was born into a Punjabi family, with his paternal side belonging to the Gujjar community, and his maternal side to the Awan community, in the small town of Morgah in Rawalpindi, Punjab.
His father, Mohammad Akhtar, whom Shoaib describes as very religious and "from a hardworking, economically unprivileged family of the Gujjar community", worked as a night watchman at a petrol station belonging to the Attock oil refinery, and married his mother, Hameeda Awan, when she was a teenager, and they had five children: four sons, Shoaib being the fourth, followed by a daughter, while his name, which in Arabic means both "the one who brings people together" and "the one who separates", was chosen by his mother.
He married Rubab Khan on 11 November 2014. In November 2016, they welcomed their first child, a son named Mohammad Mikaeel Ali, and in July 2019 they became parents a second time to another baby boy, Mujaddid. In March 2024, they welcomed a baby girl, Nooreh Ali.
Early career
A good student, Akhtar was admitted to the Asghar Mall College, but he disrupted his studies to attend trials for the PIA team's Karachi division to be held in Lahore.
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