Stuart Christopher John Broad (born 24 June 1986) is a cricketer who plays Test

Test cricket

Test cricket is the longest form of the sport of cricket. Test matches are played between national representative teams with "Test status", as determined by the International Cricket Council , with four innings played between two teams of 11 players over a period of up to a maximum five days...

 and One Day International cricket for England and is currently the captain of their Twenty20

Twenty20

Twenty20 is a form of cricket, originally introduced in England for professional inter-county competition by the England and Wales Cricket Board , in 2003. A Twenty20 game involves two teams, each has a single innings, batting for a maximum of 20 overs. Twenty20 cricket is also known as T20 cricket...

 team. A left-handed batsman and right-arm seam bowler

Seam bowling

Seam bowling is a phrase used for a bowling technique in cricket whereby the ball is deliberately bowled on to its seam, to cause a random deviation. Practitioners are known as seam bowlers or seamers....

, Broad's professional career started at Leicestershire

Leicestershire County Cricket Club

Leicestershire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh national cricket structure, representing the historic county of Leicestershire. It has also been representative of the county of Rutland....

, the team attached to his school, Oakham School

Oakham School

Oakham School is a British co-educational independent school in the historic market town of Oakham in Rutland, accepting around 1,000 pupils, aged from 10 to 18, both male and female, as boarders and day pupils . The Good Schools Guide called the school "a privileged but unpretentious and...

; in 2008 he transferred to Nottinghamshire

Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club

Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh domestic cricket structure, representing the historic county of Nottinghamshire, and the current county champions. Its limited overs team is called the Nottinghamshire Outlaws...

, the county of his birth and the team for which his father played. In August 2006 he was voted the Cricket Writers' Club Young Cricketer of the Year

Cricket Writers' Club Young Cricketer of the Year

The Young Cricketer of the Year is an annual award voted by the Cricket Writers' Club for the best young cricket player in England and Wales, and has been awarded since 1950. Former recipients include Fred Trueman, Geoffrey Boycott, Ian Botham and David Gower....

.

He was a vital member of the victorious 2009 Ashes

2009 Ashes series

The 2009 Ashes series was that year's edition of the long-standing and storied cricket rivalry between England and Australia, and was part of the Australian cricket tour of England in 2009. Starting on 8 July 2009, England and Australia played five Tests, with England winning the series 2–1...

 squad, and he won Man of the Match in the fifth Test at the Oval

The Oval

The Kia Oval, still commonly referred to by its original name of The Oval, is an international cricket ground in Kennington, in the London Borough of Lambeth. In the past it was also sometimes called the Kennington Oval...

, after figures of 5/37 in the afternoon session of the second day.