Born in 1978 in Karachi, Pakistan, Owais Shah moved to the UK with his family at the age of 8. A cricketing prodigy as a teenager, he was offered a professional contract at Middlesex County Cricket Club at the young age of 15, playing for the Under 19’s.

Inspired by other cricketers such as Viv Richards and Sachin Tendulkar, and public figures such as Nelson Mandela, whom he admires for his unfettered struggle for what he believed in, Owais Shah made his first class debut at the age of 17, in 1996, and won the NBC Denis Compton Award as the the Most Promising Young English Player in 1997. In early 1998, his stock rose after captaining England to victory in the Under 19’s World Cup in South Africa. The following season, he captained the England Under-19 team for their Test Match series at home, against Pakistan. So many achievements at such a young age led many people to label him as the finest young English batting talent in 20 years.