Ryan Butterworth

It was a long wait, but almost 10 years after his first-class debut Ryan Butterworth was finally called up to Zimbabwe's senior squad for their tour to Bangladesh in 2010-11. His call-up was a reward for outstanding form in the domestic Stanbic Bank 20 Series, in which he scored 165 runs at an average of 82.50 and an eye-catching strike-rate of 181.31. Butterworth also showed his allround value in the tournament with six wickets at an economy rate of under a-run-a-ball. He only took one catch in the competition, but it was a stunner as Butterworth sprinted in from long-off and dived full-length to get rid of Lou Vincent to aid Eagles' win in the thrilling tournament finale.

A batting allrounder from Harare, Butterworth made his first-class debut in 2000-01, when he was one of the leading students at the CFX Academy and the only one to score a century in the Logan Cup that season. While he has performed consistently for Old Hararians in the national league, for a long time Butterworth struggled to make the most of his opportunities at higher levels. An aggressive middle-order batsman, he is particularly strong through the covers and on the pull, but tends to get out for twenties and thirties after losing concentration. Butterworth started to find more consistency in the 2009-10 season, scoring two Logan Cup hundreds for the Mashonaland Eagles, and after a fantastic domestic Twenty20 season for Mashonaland Eagles it appeared he had come of age in limited-overs cricket too.
Liam Brickhill November 2010