Rishabh Pant (born 4 October 1997) is an Indian cricketer who plays as a wicketkeeper and left-handed batter. Known for fearless, often unorthodox strokeplay, he played match-winning Test innings in Australia and England and became India’s Test vice-captain. In December 2022 he was badly injured in a car accident, but he returned to win the 2024 T20 World Cup. In 2024 he became the most expensive player in IPL auction history when Lucknow Super Giants bought him for ₹27 crore.
Quick Facts
| Full name | Rishabh Rajendra Pant |
| Born | 4 October 1997, Roorkee, Uttarakhand, India |
| Age | 29 |
| Role | Wicketkeeper-batter (left-handed) |
| International debut | T20I February 2017, Test August 2018, ODI October 2018 |
| Domestic team | Delhi |
| IPL teams | Delhi Capitals (2016–2024), Lucknow Super Giants (2025–) |
| Coach | Tarak Sinha |
| Honours | ICC Emerging Cricketer of the Year (2018) |
| Known for | Gabba 2021, comeback after car crash, twin hundreds at Headingley |
Early Life
Pant grew up in Roorkee. With few facilities there, he and his mother travelled to Delhi on weekends so he could train under coach Tarak Sinha at the Sonnet Club, often staying in a gurdwara. He played for Delhi’s age-group teams and made his first-class debut in 2015. At the 2016 Under-19 World Cup he hit an 18-ball fifty against Nepal, then the fastest in the tournament’s history, and a hundred against Namibia.
Career
Delhi Daredevils (now Delhi Capitals) signed Pant in 2016, and he quickly became one of the IPL’s most exciting batters. He made his T20I debut in 2017. On his Test debut, against England at Trent Bridge in August 2018, he hit his second ball for six, the first Indian to get off the mark in Tests that way, and he made his first Test hundred at The Oval in the same series. He was named the ICC’s Emerging Cricketer of the Year for 2018.
Pant scored an unbeaten 159 at Sydney in January 2019 during India’s first Test series win in Australia. Two years later, on the 2020–21 tour, he hit 97 at Sydney and an unbeaten 89 on the final day at the Gabba in Brisbane to chase down 328 and win the series, one of the most famous innings in Indian Test history. He was made captain of Delhi Capitals in 2021.
In the early hours of 30 December 2022 Pant’s car crashed and caught fire on the Delhi–Dehradun highway near Roorkee while he was driving home. He escaped through a window with severe knee, ankle and head injuries and needed several operations. After more than a year of rehabilitation he returned in the 2024 IPL and was part of the Indian team that won the 2024 T20 World Cup in June that year.
At the IPL auction in November 2024 Lucknow Super Giants bought Pant for ₹27 crore and made him captain. On India’s 2025 tour of England, as Test vice-captain, he scored hundreds in both innings at Headingley, becoming the first wicketkeeper to do so in a Test. Later in that series he batted on with a fractured foot at Old Trafford.
Personal Life
Pant’s father, Rajendra Pant, died in 2017, during that year’s IPL; Pant flew home for the funeral and returned to play days later. He is close to his mother, Saroj, and his sister, Sakshi.
Awards and Honours
Major Titles
Frequently Asked Questions
When and where was Rishabh Pant born?
Rishabh Pant was born on 4 October 1997 in Roorkee, Uttarakhand, India and is 29 years old.
What is Rishabh Pant known for?
Known for: Gabba 2021, comeback after car crash, twin hundreds at Headingley.
What honours has Rishabh Pant received?
ICC Emerging Cricketer of the Year (2018).
Featured image: Rishabh Pant with Prime Minister Narendra Modi after India’s T20 World Cup win, New Delhi, 4 July 2024. Photo by Prime Minister’s Office, licensed under Government Open Data License – India, via Wikimedia Commons.
