Daniel Luca Vettori (born 27 January 1979) is a cricketer for the New Zealand cricket team, where he is the current captain. He is the eighth player in Test history to take 300 wickets and score 3,000 runs. He is the youngest player to have represented New Zealand in Test cricket, having made his debut in 1996–97 at the age of 18. Vettori is a bowling all-rounder who bowls slow left-arm orthodox spin; he is known for his accuracy, flight and guile rather than prodigious turn. He has a Test batting average of around 30 making him one of the more consistent and better batsmen in the New Zealand cricket team. In the fourth season of Indian Premier League, he was contracted by Royal Challengers Bangalore for US$550,000. He is currently the captain of the Royal Challengers Bangalore team. He is currently ranked as the No.1 bowler in ODIs by ICC.

He was born in Auckland and brought up in Hamilton, attending Marian School and later St. Paul's Collegiate School. When available, he plays provincial cricket for Northern Districts and is also an international member of Indian Premier League team the Royal Challengers Bangalore. Vettori also represents the Queensland Bulls in the KFC Twenty20 Big Bash. He is among a very small minority of international sports stars to wear prescription spectacles while playing sport and is the first cricketer of Italian descent to represent New Zealand.

Bowling Records

He took his 300th Test wicket in Sri Lanka in 2009, becoming only the second New Zealand bowler (after Richard Hadlee) to pass that mark and he is currently New Zealand's leading ODI wicket-taker.

Vettori has three 10 wicket hauls in Test cricket, against Sri Lanka, Australia and Bangladesh. His best innings figures were achieved at Auckland in 1999–2000 against Australia where he took 7/87. He finished with career best match figures in that game, taking 12/149. They are the second best ever by a New Zealander, with only Richard Hadlee having taken more in a match. With another 12 wicket effort, against Bangladesh in Chittagong, he became the only New Zealander to have taken a dozen wickets in a Test on two occasions.

He is the bowler to have most frequently dismissed Shane Warne in Tests, getting him out nine times, most notably for 99 in a Test at Perth. Ironically, in the 1st Test against Pakistan in 2009–10 season, Vettori was himself dismissed for 99,while chasing a world record in centuries batting from position number 8.

Captaincy

Prior to becoming captain on a permanent basis in 2007, Vettori had captained the Black Caps in ODI cricket on occasions such as when regular captain Stephen Fleming was not available. As of the end of 2006, he had led New Zealand in 11 games, winning eight of them.

He captained New Zealand at the inaugural Twenty20 World Championship in South Africa.Subsequently, it was announced that Vettori would captain the Black Caps in all forms of the game: Twenty20s, ODIs and Tests. Initially, he was announced to only be captain of the former two.

Vettori's captaincy has had a rocky start, losing a Test series in England first up. Vettori also attracted some criticism in the following ODI series when he engaged in angry shouting from the balcony at The Oval, regarding a controversial run out that had occurred. He then refused to shake hands with the England team after the match. This contrasted with Fleming's more languid, laid back style.

Vettori will stand down from captaincy, and retire from One day Internationals and Twenty20 Internationals after the 2011 Cricket World Cup.

Batting

Vettori has matured into a useful lower-order batsman, having scored 3,000 Test runs, including five centuries (134 against Pakistan 2009, 140 against Sri Lanka 2009,137* against Pakistan in 2003 ,127 against Zimbabwe in 2005 and 118 against India in 2009) as well as several half-centuries. Although it took Vettori 47 Tests to score his first 1,000 runs at an average of 17.24, the second thousand took him just 22 Tests at a rate of 42.52 per innings.

In December 2006, Vettori began establishing himself as more of an all-rounder, batting at number 5 for New Zealand in the one-day series against Sri Lanka.

On 4 December 2009, despite the Black Caps only scoring 99 runs against Pakistan, Vettori became the highest Test run scorer batting at no.8 spot, a record previously held by Shane Warne. For the third Test against Pakistan that started on 11 December 2009, Vettori promoted himself to no.6 in the batting order, it is presumed he will bat at this position in future Test matches.

After suffering a dip in form of batting in 2010 Vettori scored a century against Pakistan when he made 110 as New Zealand's lower order resisted to help post a total of 356 all out. Vettori averages a career 30.09 but his average jumps to 57.9 against Pakistan against whom he has three of his six centuries.

 Achievements

Test Centuries

• In the column Runs, * indicates being not out.
• The column title Match refers to the Match Number of his career.

Daniel Vettori's Test Centuries
No.	Runs	Match	Against	City/Country	Venue	Year	Result
1	137*	49	Pakistan	Hamilton, New Zealand	Seddon Park	2003	Drawn
2	127	63	Zimbabwe	Harare, Zimbabwe	Harare Sports Club	2005	Won
3	118	90	India	Hamilton, New Zealand	Seddon Park	2009	Lost
4	140	94	Sri Lanka	Colombo, Sri Lanka	Sinhalese Sports Club	2009	Lost
5	134	97	Pakistan	Napier, New Zealand	McLean Park	2009	Drawn
6	110	105	Pakistan	Wellington, New Zealand	Basin Reserve	2011	Drawn

Test 5-Wicket Hauls

Daniel Vettori's Test 5-Wicket Hauls
No.	Figures	Match	Against	City/Country	Venue	Year	Result
1	5-84	4	India	Hamilton, New Zealand	Seddon Park	1997	Won
2	6-64	14	India	Colombo, Sri Lanka	Sinhalese Sports Club	1998	Lost
3	6-127	25	India	Kanpur, India	Green Park	1999	Lost
4	5-62	29	Australia	Auckland, New Zealand	Eden Park	2000	Lost
5	7-87
6	5-138	33	Australia	Hobart, Australia	Bellerive Oval	2001	Drawn
7	6-87	34	Australia	Perth, Australia	W.A.C.A. Ground	2001	Drawn
8	6-28	56	Bangladesh	Dhaka, Bangladesh	Bangabandhu National Stadium	2004	Won
9	6-70	57	Bangladesh	Chittagong, Bangladesh	MA Aziz Stadium	2004	Won
10	6-100
11	5-152	59	Australia	Adelaide, Australia	Adelaide Oval	2004	Lost
12	5-106	60	Australia	Christchurch, New Zealand	AMI Stadium	2005	Lost
13	7-130	73	Sri Lanka	Wellington, New Zealand	Basin Reserve	2006	Lost
14	5-69	81	England	London, England	Lord's	2008	Drawn
15	5-66	82	England	Manchester, England	Old Trafford	2008	Lost
16	5-59	84	Bangladesh	Chittagong, Bangladesh	Zohur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium	2008	Won
17	5-66	85	Bangladesh	Dhaka, Bangladesh	Shere Bangla National Stadium	2008	Drawn
18	6-56	88	West Indies	Dunedin, New Zealand	University Oval	2008	Drawn

 One Day International 5-Wicket Hauls

Daniel Vettori's One Day International 5-Wicket Hauls
No.	Figures	Match	Against	City/Country	Venue	Year	Result
1	5-30	137	West Indies	London, England	Lord's	2004	Won
2	5-7	210	Bangladesh	Queenstown, New Zealand	Queenstown Events Centre	2007	Won

 Personal life

Vettori is married to Mary O'Carroll, with whom he has two children. He moved from Hamilton to Auckland to live with her but has continued playing for the Northern Districts Knights. They have a son named James (born 8 March 2009).

Biography

A biography of Vettori was published in August 2008.Daniel Vettori is first cousins with David Hill, a former one test five-eighth for the New Zealand All Blacks and is now playing with Super14 franchise Western Force.