V. R. V. Singh

Vikram Raj Vir Singh (born 17 September 1984), commonly known as V. R. V. Singh, is an Indian cricketer who has been a member of the Indian cricket team since April 2006. He is a right-arm fast-medium bowler. He is considered as one of the few genuine fast bowlers India has produced over the last decade. After being called into the Indian squad to play Sri Lanka in 2005, he failed a fitness test and was promptly dropped. He finally played his first One Day International against England at Jamshedpur. He debuted in Tests against the West Indies in June 2006.

Singh was born in Chandigarh in Punjab, India. He has always been a fast bowler and has compromised his accuracy for extra pace. He debuted for the Punjab in the 2003/04 Ranji Trophy season and continues to play first class cricket for the Punjab. According to former coach of Punjab, Bhupinder Singh Senior, "All he wants to do is bowl fast, nothing else matters to him". He played for India in the Under-19 Cricket World Cup in 2004 but disappointed with the ball, going for an expensive 44 runs in five overs in his only match. He later received the Border-Gavaskar scholarship which allowed him to train in cricket academies in Australia. His fellow scholarship holder, R. P. Singh, also later went on to play for India.

Singh began his domestic career with the Punjab cricket team in the Limited Overs version of the Ranji Trophy. He played only one match and went wicketless. However, when he made his debut for Punjab in the first class version of the Trophy, he averaged 21.00 over his 6 matches and took 30 wickets. However, he was still unimpressive in ODIs, averaging 109.00 over 4 matches. Despite this, he was selected for the Indian ODI squad against Sri Lanka after playing only 5 ODIs for his state, but was sent back to the domestic circuit after failing a fitness test. He improved his performance in the 2005-06 ODI Ranji Trophy season, averaging 20.75 over his 4 matches, which included a 4 wicket haul.