Mohammed Shami has become the 58th Indian cricketer to receive the esteemed Arjuna Award. The Arjuna Award, the second-highest sporting honour in India, is presented by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports to recognize the outstanding achievements of sportspersons at the international level.
Shami's outstanding performance in the 2023 World Cup played a pivotal role in securing the Arjuna Award for him. During the tournament, he took an astonishing 24 wickets from seven matches at a remarkable average of 10.70 runs per wicket.
Over the last four years (2020-2023), Shami has accumulated a total of 127 international wickets across formats – 54 in Tests at an average of 29.70, 59 in ODIs at 20.64 apiece, and 14 in T20Is at 31.14 apiece. Only three other Indian bowlers – Ravichandran Ashwin (154), Jasprit Bumrah (139), and Mohammed Siraj (138) – have taken more international wickets than him during this period.
Here is the comprehensive list of Arjuna Awardees in Indian Cricket:
1. 1961 Salim Durani2. 1964 Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi3. 1965 Vijay Manjrekar4. 1966 Chandu Borde5. 1967 Ajit Wadekar6. 1968 E. A. S. Prasanna7. 1969 Bishan Singh Bedi8. 1970 Dilip Sardesai9. 1971 Srinivasaraghavan Venkataraghavan10. 1972 B. S. Chandrashekhar11. 1972 Eknath Solkar12. 1975 Sunil Gavaskar13. 1977–1978 Gundappa Viswanath14. 1979–1980 Kapil Dev15. 1980–1981 Chetan Chauhan16. 1980–1981 Syed Kirmani17. 1981 Dilip Vengsarkar18. 1982 Mohinder Amarnath19. 1984 Ravi Shastri20. 1986 Mohammad Azharuddin21. 1989 Madan Lal22. 1993 Kiran More23. 1993 Manoj Prabhakar24. 1994 Sachin Tendulkar25. 1995 Anil Kumble26. 1996 Javagal Srinath27. 1997 Sourav Ganguly28. 1997 Ajay Jadeja29. 1998 Rahul Dravid30. 1998 Nayan Mongia31. 2000 Venkatesh Prasad32. 2001 VVS Laxman33. 2002 Virender Sehwag34. 2003 Harbhajan Singh35. 2009 Gautam Gambhir36. 2011 Zaheer Khan37. 2012 Yuvraj Singh38. 2013 Virat Kohli39. 2014 Ravichandran Ashwin40. 2015 Rohit Sharma41. 2016 Ajinkya Rahane42. 2017 Cheteshwar Pujara43. 2019 Ravindra Jadeja44 2020 Ishant Sharma45. 2021 Shikhar Dhawan46. 2023 Mohammed Shami
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Here is the list of Indian female cricketers honored with the Arjuna Award:
1. 1976 Shantha Rangaswamy2. 1983 Diana Edulji3. 1985 Shubhangi Kulkarni4. 1986 Sandhya Agarwal5. 2003 Mithali Raj6. 2005 Anju Jain7. 2006 Anjum Chopra8. 2010 Jhulan Goswami9. 2017 Harmanpreet Kaur10. 2018 Smriti Mandhana11. 2019 Poonam Yadav12. 2020 Deepti Sharma