Name: Benjamin Thomas Foakes
Benjamin Thomas Foakes is an English professional cricketer. He plays international cricket for the England Test team. In domestic cricket, he represents the county of Surrey, though he previously played for Essex earlier in his career.
Foakes made his first-class debut for Essex during the 2011 English domestic season. It came in a match against the touring Sri Lankan national team at the County Ground in Chelmsford. In Essex's first innings, Foakes was dismissed for a score of 5 runs by Sri Lankan bowler Thisara Perera. While keeping wicket, Foakes took a total of 3 catches in the match - 2 in Sri Lanka's first innings and 1 in their second innings.
In September 2011, Essex awarded Foakes his first professional contract, which was set to run until the end of the 2013 season. On August 14, 2014, it was publicly announced that Foakes would be leaving Essex to join the Surrey County Cricket Club from the following season onwards.
Foakes was a member of the Surrey squad that won the 2018 County Championship title. He was also part of their squad that won the 2022 County Championship.
On September 18, 2023, Foakes signed a new multi-year contract extension to remain at Surrey. This came after he had established himself as a very important member of their team through his excellent wicketkeeping abilities and reliable batting contributions.
At the youth level, Foakes made his debut for the England Under-19 team in January 2011 during their tour of Sri Lanka. He played 2 Youth Test matches on that tour against the Sri Lanka U-19 team. It was also on this tour that Foakes made his Youth One Day International debut for England U-19s. In total, he has played 6 Youth ODIs for England, with his most recent appearance coming in July 2011 when he played 3 matches against South Africa U-19s.
Foakes finally made his Test debut for England on November 6, 2018 against Sri Lanka. In his debut innings, he scored 107 runs which helped England post a competitive total. Foakes became the 20th batsman for England to score a century on his Test debut. He was the second English wicket-keeper to achieve this feat after Matt Prior. Overall, Foakes was the 5th wicket-keeper batsman from any country to score a century on his Test debut.
In April 2019, Foakes was selected in England's squad for the one-off ODI against Ireland and the one-off T20I against Pakistan. This came after the originally selected Sam Billings suffered a dislocated shoulder injury. On May 3, 2019, Foakes made his ODI debut for England against Ireland.
Following the COVID-19 pandemic, Foakes was one of 55 players named on May 29, 2020 to begin training ahead of England's restart of international games at home that summer. He was then included in England's 30-man training squad announced on June 17, 2020 to prepare for their upcoming Test series against the West Indies behind closed doors. On July 4, 2020, Foakes was named as one of the 9 reserve players for the first Test of that series.
In February 2021, Foakes played in England's away Test series against India, replacing Jos Buttler from the second Test onwards. In the second Test in Chennai, Foakes performed 3 stumpings, making him the first English wicket-keeper to achieve that feat in Asia and equalling England's record for the most stumpings by a keeper in a single Test match.
Foakes was expected to make his home Test debut for England in the 2021 series against New Zealand. However, he had to miss that series due to a hamstring injury.
Foakes returned to England's Test team as the first-choice wicket-keeper for their 2022 home series against New Zealand and South Africa. He made important contributions with both his wicket-keeping and batting in those series.
