Luke Jongwe

Luke Jongwe player profile

A right-arm medium fast bowler and useful lower middle-order batter, Luke Jongwe was only 19 when he was handed an ODI debut and 20 when he made his T20I debut. However, his international career has been more of a stop-start, including long stints on the sidelines.

Jongwe first represented Zimbabwe at the Under-19 World Cup in 2012 and 2014. In the 2012 edition, he was Zimbabwe's highest wicket-taker with ten wickets in five matches. In 2014 then, while he couldn't do much with the ball, Jongwe finished as Zimbabwe's highest run-getter with 219 runs in six games.

Jongwe made his first-class debut in the 2013-14 Logan Cup season for Southern Rocks. In just his second game, he smashed an unbeaten 132 against Mountaineers while in his third game, he picked a match haul of 7 for 90 against Matabeleland Tuskers. Jongwe subsequently made his List A debut in December 2013. After staying with Rocks for just one season, Jongwe moved to Tuskers where he had a bumper start in the 2014-15 Logan Cup. He finished that season as the second-highest wicket-taker with 34 scalps in nine games and scored 379 runs at 31.58. It was on the back of his all-round show that Tuskers lifted the Logan Cup title that year.

Jongwe was fast-tracked into the Zimbabwe A setup and soon made his ODI debut against South Africa in August 2014 and his T20I debut against Pakistan the following year. In an ODI in 2016, Jongwe picked 5 for 6 against Afghanistan, which remains the sixth-best bowling figures for a Zimbabwe bowler in ODIs. However, a dip in form meant that Jongwe lost his place in the ODI team for close to five years and only made a comeback in 2021. He remained a key part of the T20I side though and also made his Test debut in May 2021 against Pakistan in Harare.