Test Career
After the World Cup Zimbabwe were promoted to Test status and Flower was unanimously selected to play against the Indians for the Inaugural Test match. On a flat pitch, he opened the batting for his country and dominated in a 100 run opening stand. He would go on to score 82, falling short of a century on Test debut. Zimbabwe again met the Indians this time on their home turf and again fell just short of a maiden Test century when he fell for 96.
Pakistan toured Zimbabwe in 1995 and in the 1st Test Flower finally scored his maiden Test century. Not content, he went on to register double hundred. He hit only 12 boundaries and faced 523 balls as Zimbabwe scored a massive 4/544 declared. His innings would help Zimbabwe to win their first ever Test match as they won by a convincing Innings and 64 Runs. He would continue to haunt the Pakistani side, scoring his second Test century at Sheikhupura Stadium in Pakistan.
In 1997 Flower became the first Zimbabwean to score a double century in both innings of a Test match. Playing against New Zealand in Harare, he scored 204 and 251. A year later he scored his 5th Test century, an innings of 156 not out at Queens Sports Club against Pakistan. He would suffer a form slump after that innings, not scoring a 99 for 33 innings including 6 ducks. On 25 November 2000 he ended his slump with a fine 106 against India and would go on to score 4 50's in his next 6 innings.
Read more about this topic: Grant Flower
Famous quotes containing the words test and/or career:
“Utopias are presented for our inspection as a critique of the human state. If they are to be treated as anything but trivial exercises of the imagination. I suggest there is a simple test we can apply.... We must forget the whole paraphernalia of social description, demonstration, expostulation, approbation, condemnation. We have to say to ourselves, “How would I myself live in this proposed society? How long would it be before I went stark staring mad?””
—William Golding (b. 1911)
“A black boxer’s career is the perfect metaphor for the career of a black male. Every day is like being in the gym, sparring with impersonal opponents as one faces the rudeness and hostility that a black male must confront in the United States, where he is the object of both fear and fascination.”
—Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)