Bilal Mustapha Shafayat is an English

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 cricketer

Cricketer

A cricketer is a person who plays the sport of cricket. Official and long-established cricket publications prefer the traditional word "cricketer" over the rarely used term "cricket player"....

. He is a middle-order batsman, fast bowler

Fast bowling

Fast bowling, sometimes known as pace bowling, is one of the two main approaches to bowling in the sport of cricket. The other is spin bowling...

 and wicket-keeper

Wicket-keeper

The wicket-keeper in the sport of cricket is the player on the fielding side who stands behind the wicket or stumps being guarded by the batsman currently on strike...

. Shafayat was a former captain of the England under-19 side.

He was educated at the Nottingham Bluecoat School but left after he found a place in cricket.

He started his career at 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...

 but moved to Northamptonshire

Northamptonshire County Cricket Club

Northamptonshire 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 Northamptonshire. Its limited overs team is called the Northants Steelbacks. The traditional club colour is Maroon. During the...

 in 2005. One early highlight of his career was a catch made for England

English cricket team

The England and Wales cricket team is a cricket team which represents England and Wales. Until 1992 it also represented Scotland. Since 1 January 1997 it has been governed by the England and Wales Cricket Board , having been previously governed by Marylebone Cricket Club from 1903 until the end...

 as a substitute fielder in a 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...

 against New Zealand

New Zealand cricket team

The New Zealand cricket team, nicknamed the Black Caps, are the national cricket team representing New Zealand. They played their first in 1930 against England in Christchurch, New Zealand, becoming the fifth country to play Test cricket. It took the team until 1955–56 to win a Test, against the...

 in 2004. He returned to Nottinghamshire for the 2007 season.

He was the twelfth man in the 2009 Cardiff Test against Australia. He was the focus of a controversy when he came out twice during the final overs of the match as the last pair of England batsmen were trying to save the match. The Australian captain

Ricky Ponting

Ricky Thomas Ponting , nicknamed Punter, is an Australian cricketer, a former captain of the Australian cricket team between 2004 and 2011 in Test cricket and 2002 and 2011 in One Day International cricket. He is a specialist right-handed batsman, slips and close catching fielder, as well as a very...

accused the England team of time-wasting.

He was released by Nottinghamshire after the 2010 season. He played domestic First Class cricket in Pakistan in 2010/2011, before returning to Northamptonshire on a match-by-match basis during the 2011 season , playing for the Second XI and the first team in Twenty20 and List A matches during June and July 2011. He ended the season playing for Wellington in the Birmingham league