Jamaican all-rounder Andre Russell signed as one of the county’s two overseas players for the 2016 NatWest t20 Blast (as it was called at the time), with a burgeoning reputation as a free-hitting batsman and an effective white-ball bowler.
His season at Trent Bridge was curtailed by some unseasonable rain early in the campaign but he did play in three group section matches, helping Notts comfortably win the North Group; the team eventually lost in the semi-final at Edgbaston but by that time Russell had left for other commitments. His value as a bowler was underlined by his figures – he bowled his full allocation of four overs in each match, taking overall seven wickets at just 11.71 and with a strike rate of a wicket every 10.28 deliveries, his best return in more than 300 T20 games played around the world.
The Outlaws did not see the best of his batting – in three innings his best was 41 – but in the seasons that followed Russell achieved the status of one of the best T20 all-rounders in world cricket.
He was named in the 'Team of the Tournament' for the 2016 T20 World Cup. Russell scored a century in a record 40 balls in the 2018 Caribbean Premier League and took a hat-trick in the same match, becoming the second player to take a hat-trick and score a century in the same Twenty20 match.
In the Indian Premier League, only his countryman Chris Gayle has hit more sixes in a season than Russell managed in 2019, when he was named in the IPL XI at the end of the tournament.
Andre Russell – who records under the name Dre Russ – is married to US model Jassym Lora.
May 2020