It was a Zimbabwe Cricket programme in 1992 to spread cricket which started me playing. Before that I hadn’t known anything about the game. But I developed an interest in it soon enough.

In 1996, I was given a scholarship to join Churchill Boys and started playing at the school level. There were only four boys who had got the scholarship from over a hundred and it made me believe that I had a future in the game.

We trained as a part of a programme called Strugglers’ Programme and in the first two years, I had not taken the game seriously. Then one day Andrew Flower who was the captain of the national side at that time handed me the wicket-keeping gloves. Andrew’s father used to run the programme and Andrew had turned at the camp to encourage us. This made me think about taking cricket up as a profession.

At the age of 15, I made it to the U-19 World Cup team to Sri Lanka. I started feeling the pressure and realised I was too young to be in the national side and decided to get back to school.

There was a lot of opposition from family and friends who wanted me to stick on. It was the toughest decision of my life because I had to go against my mother’s wishes. I wanted be mature and be ready for the tough world when I got back. It wasn’t easy but was a worthwhile decision.

My one-day International debut at 17 was tough. I knew I had to learn quickly and had to work doubly hard. I was seen as the most hard-working guy in the team and earned respect. And that led to my getting the captaincy.

I am now looking forward to India’s tour to Zimbabwe. I might also go to England to play some club cricket. And then I’ll see how much cricket comes up.

(As told to Promita Mukherjee)