Matthew Scott Wade is an Australian wicketkeeper and left-handed batsman. He was born in Hobart, Tasmania, Australia, on December 26, 1987. He is colorblind and has fought and defeated testicular cancer.
Background
Wade played cricket and Australian Rules Football when he was 19 years old. He represented Australia in the 2006 Under-19 Cricket World Cup and vice-captained the Tassie Mariners in the TAC Cup.
He played one List A match for Tasmania before moving to Victoria for the 2007–08 season to try his luck. He quickly established himself as Victoria’s first-choice goalkeeper, winning him a spot in the Australia A side in 2010.
Wade established himself as the state’s first choice wicket keeper after moving to Victoria in the 2007–08 season, ahead of Adam Crosthwaite.
Wade made his first-class century during the 2008–09 season. He was instrumental in Victoria’s victory over Queensland in the Sheffield Shield final in 2009–10, when he batted at no. 6 with the team at 60 and scored 96 runs for the team. Victoria won by a massive 457 runs, and Wade was named man of the match.
Wade’s best first-class score was 152 for Victoria in the Sheffield Shield in February 2015.
Debut
In October 2011, he was called up to the Australian team for the T20I against South Africa after his success in domestic limited overs cricket was noted.
On April 7th, he made his Test debut against the West Indies in Barbados.
Rise to Glory
In February 2012, he made his international debut in a T20I match between Australia and India in Sydney, where he was the opener and scored 72 runs off 43 balls to earn the Man of the Match trophy.
Wade was named to the Australian ODI team for the 2011–12 Commonwealth Bank Series after his T20 results. He was named Man of the Match for the second time, this time against India at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, where he scored 67 runs off 69 balls.
During the 2011–12 season, Wade was the Australian limited overs wicketkeeper in a match against the West Indies. As a result of Brad Haddin’s return to Australia, he was also appointed Test wicketkeeper. In Roseau, he made his first Test century with a score of 106. Wade also played in the November 2012 Test series against South Africa.
Wade maintained his ODI wicket-keeping position for a short period, but lost his Test wicket-keeping position to Brad Haddin for the 2013 Ashes series. Finally, he was left out of the Australian Cricket World Cup team for 2015.
Captaincy
Wade scored his first ODI century in the first ODI against Pakistan on 13 January 2017, and on the 27th of the same month, he was elected Australia’s ODI captain for the series against New Zealand.