Reaching another milestone, Indian spin bowler Ravichandran Ashwin on Sunday became the fastest bowler to take 250 test wickets in 45 matches.
With this wicket, Ashwin also became the sixth Indian bowler, 40th overall and 12th spinner to have scalped 250 wickets in Tests. Anil Kumble (619), Kapil Dev (434), Harbhajan Singh (417), Zaheer Khan (311) and Bishan Singh Bedi (266) are the other five Indian bowlers with 250 and more wickets in Tests. Prior to this Test, Ashwin was two wickets away from the landmark. He came close to it by first dismissing Shakib Al Hasan and then Mushfiqur.
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Ashwin surpassed the record of former Australian pacer Dennis Lillee, who had achieved this feat in 48 Tests. Among the Indian bowlers, the previous record to reach the landmark was of Kumble, who took his 250th wicket in 55th Test. Ashwin has been breaking records continuously since the start of 2016-17 season. So far, he has got 57 wickets in this season and 7 more will make him go past Kapil Dev‘s record of most wickets in an Indian season, while 8 will make go past Kumble’s tally of most wickets by an Indian bowler in a season.
Ashwin made his Test debut in November 2011 against West Indies and since then, he has been the regular member of the team. Also, out of all of his wickets, 132 of them were of left-handed batsman. Only Muttiah Muralitharan (191), Shane Warne (172), Kumble (167) and Harbhajan (139) have dismissed more left-handers.