Ravi Ashwin surpasses Courtney Walsh and becomes the 8th-highest Wicket-Taker in Test Cricket: Indian Cricket Team’s star off-spinner Ravi Ashwin, who is sitting comfortably at the top of ICC Men’s Test-Bowling rankings, went past West Indies’ former seamer Courtney Walsh’s wicket tally of 519 scalps on Sunday (22nd of September) to become the eighth-highest wicket taker in Test Cricket.
The veteran off-spinner completed this accomplishment by dismissing Bangladesh’s Shakib Al Hasan during the morning session of the fourth day of the ongoing First Test-Match of the two encounter series between India & Bangladesh at the Chepauk Stadium of Chennai.
By picking up his fourth-wicket of the second inning, Ashwin has increased his wicket tally to 520 wickets in 101 Test-matches for the Men in Blue.
The record of picking up the highest number of wickets in the longest format of the game belongs to Sri Lanka’s legendary spinner Mutthiah Muralitharan. The off-spinner finished his Test-Career by dismissing batters 800 times in 133 encounters.
Australia’s Shane Warne is the second highest wicket-taker with 708 wickets next to his name in 145 test matches, followed by England’s legendary fast bowler Jimmy Anderson (704 wickets), Anil Kumble of India (619 scalps) and the Australian duo of Glenn McGrath (563 wickets) and Nathan Lyon (530*wickets).
R Ashwin, who went wicketless in the first inning of the first test-match versus Bangladesh, picked up his first-wicket of the ongoing encounter by sending Shadman Islam back to the pavilion. The Bangladeshi opening batter sent an easy catch in the hands of Shubman Gill on the third delivery of the 22nd-over.
Following the dismissal of Shadman, Ashwin didn’t look in the mood of stopping as he got rid of the duo of Mushfiqur Rahim and Mominul Haque during the final session of the third-day of the first test.
While the 38-year-old clean bowled Mominul, Lokesh Rahul executed a brilliant catch to send Rahim (13 runs) back to the dugout.
If in the ongoing first-test between India & Bangladesh, R Ashwin manages to dismiss one more Bangladeshi batter, then he will complete his 11th fifer in WTC and 37th in the longest format of the game.
His 11th Five-Wicket-Haul will allow the Indian spinner to break the record of Nathan Lyon of completing the highest number of five-wicket-hauls in the history of WTC and his 37th fifer in Test-Cricket will help him to equal the record of the legendary Shane Warne.
The record of completing the highest number of five-wicket-hauls in Test-Cricket belongs to Mutthiah Muralitharan, who has 67 fifers next to his name.
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