Ronnie Hira

Ronnie Hira
Personal information
Born	23 January 1987 (age 37); Auckland, New Zealand
Batting	Left-handed
Bowling	Slow left-arm orthodox
Role	Bowler
International information
National side	New Zealand (2012–2013);
T20I debut (cap 53)	11 February 2012 v Zimbabwe
Last T20I	27 June 2013 v England
Domestic team information
2006/07–2011/12	Auckland
2012/13–2015/16	Canterbury
2016/17	Northern Districts
2017/18–2019/20	Auckland
Career statistics
	Source: Cricinfo, 15 August 2022

Roneel Magan Hira (born 23 January 1987) is a New Zealand Twenty20 International cricketer who is a left-arm off spinner. His relaxed attitude to cricket and his bowling style have been compared to Phil Tufnell. He was born in Auckland.

Domestic career

Hira made his debut for Auckland in first-class, List A and Twenty20 matches in the 2006–07 season. He represented New Zealand in the 2006 Under-19 Cricket World Cup in Sri Lanka. He last played a first-class game in March 2008, but has represented Auckland with more regularity in the limited-overs formats. Hira was a part of the Auckland 50-over and Twenty20 sides that won the New Zealand domestic titles in 2010–11. He subsequently travelled to India with the Auckland Aces as part of their unsuccessful campaign in the Champions League Twenty20, an international Twenty20 cricket competition between club teams from India, Australia, England, South Africa, Sri Lanka, New Zealand and West Indies.

After three seasons as a contracted player for the Auckland Aces, Hira's domestic contract was not renewed for the 2011–12 season.^[1] Despite only receiving match payments, Hira was the bowling standout of the domestic Twenty20 competition in the 2011–12 season and was an integral part of Auckland's successful defence of the HRV Twenty20 Cup. In an impressive campaign, he took 14 wickets at an average of 14.85 and, most importantly given the high-scoring Twenty20 format, conceded only 5.85 runs an over.^[2]

Hira finished the Twenty-20 competition as the joint leading wicket-taker and impressed with his sharp fielding and his batting cameos lower down the order. On the back of this performance, Hira was the winner of the HRV Cup MVP bowling rankings. His 76.06 MVP bowling points placed him well clear of the Canterbury Wizards' Rob Nicol who was second with 54.27; he got the HRV Cup MVP award for 2014.^[3]