(Cricket news) Ravichandran Ashwin is currently playing his 80th test match and is only four wickets away from becoming the third highest wicket taker for India. He is playing in the ongoing test against New Zealand and will look to surpass Harbhajan Singh’s record of 417 wickets. Ashwin is the only player in the top five wicket takers in India to have played less than 100 Test matches, he also has the second most five wicket hauls among Indians only behind Spin legend Anil Kumble. Kumble has taken 35 five wicket hauls while Ashwin has taken 30 and is only 1 behind Kumble in most 10 wicket hauls with 7 of them.

Ashwin is also the leading wicket taker along with Shaheen Afridi in Tests this year as both of them have taken 38 wickets. Afridi is currently playing his 8th match of the season as for Ashwin he is playing his 7th match. Ashwin is the only active bowler to have taken more than 70 Test wickets in a season, he did it in 2016 where he took 72 wickets in 12 matches. From 2015 to 2017 he played 32 matches and took 190 wickets which was his prime period as he led the bowling department. He is the fastest bowler to take 250 wickets as he did it in 45 matches, fastest to 300 which he only took 54 matches, joint fastest to 350 along with Muthiah Muralidaran as they both took 66 matches.

It has been 10 years since Ashwin had made his debut for India against West Indies. He took three wickets in the first innings and took 6 in the second to finish the match with 9 wickets and a man of the match award. In the third test, he again took a five wicket haul and took four in the second innings to win the man of the match as well as man of the series award.

Apart from being a world class bowler, Ashwin has also scored 5 centuries and 11 half centuries. Among the five matches he scored a century, he took a five wicket haul in three of them thus proving himself as an all rounder in the longest format. The 35 year old has been a part of the Indian team since 2010 although he has not been a regular part of the shorter formats, he is indeed one of the best bowlers the country has ever produced in test matches.

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