| Personal information | ||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Harshad Vallabhbhai Patel | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | 29 January 1964 Nairobi, Kenya | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Batting | Right-handed | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Bowling | Right-arm off break | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Relations | Dipak Patel (cousin) | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Domestic team information | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| Years | Team | |||||||||||||||||||||
| 1985 | Worcestershire | |||||||||||||||||||||
| 1988–1990 | Staffordshire | |||||||||||||||||||||
| 1992–2012 | Herefordshire | |||||||||||||||||||||
| Career statistics | ||||||||||||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||||||||||||
Source:Cricinfo,22 September 2021 | ||||||||||||||||||||||
Harshad Vallabhbhai Patel (born 29 January 1964) is a Kenyan-born English former first-class cricketer.
A cousin of the New Zealand Test cricketer Dipak Patel,he was born in Nairobi in January 1964. After emigrating to England,Patel played first-class cricket for Worcestershire on a single occasion in 1985 against Cambridge University at Fenner's. [1] Opening the batting alongside Lawrence Smith in Worcestershire's only innings,he was dismissed for 37 runs by Archie Cotterell. [2] Patel did not feature for Worcestershire following this match. He joined Staffordshire in 1988,featuring for the county in minor counties cricket until 1990, [3] [4] and also made his debut in List A one-day cricket for the county against Glamorgan in the 1989 NatWest Trophy, [5] scoring 63 runs in a losing cause against their first-class opponents. [6]
After a two year break from county cricket,Patel joined Herefordshire in 1992,with the county having just been admitted to minor counties cricket to replace Durham who had been elevated to first-class status. Patel remained as a player with Herefordshire until 2012,making 103 appearances in the Minor Counties Championship and 38 appearances in the MCCA Knockout Trophy. [3] [7] In the Minor Counties Championship,he scored over 6,000 runs for Herefordshire,with eight centuries. [8] He also made twelve List A appearances for Herefordshire when they were permitted to take part in the domestic one-day competition, [5] scoring 196 runs with a highest score of 68. [9] Harshad later coached Herefordshire and led them to victory in the 2016 MCC Knockout Trophy. His tenure as coach ended in 2017,with Patel considering himself to have been made a scapegoat by the Herefordshire committee for the lack of Herefordshire based players in the county eleven. [10]