BIRMINGHAM: England captain Joe Root became the quickest batsman to 6,000 Test runs in terms of time from his debut when he reached the landmark on the first day of the series opener against India at Edgbaston on Wednesday. A streaky four off spinner Ravichandran Ashwin saw the 27-year-old Root, in his 127th Test innings, to the 40 runs he had needed to reach 6,000. It meant Root, who won the toss, had got to the landmark in five years and 231 days of his Test career, surpassing former England captain Alastair Cook’s mark of five years and 339 days. It is perhaps unsurprising that two England batsmen are at the top of this list given how much Test cricket their side plays, with Wednesday’s match their 1,000th fixture at this level. To put Root’s achievement into perspective, Donald Bradman remains the quickest batsman to 6,000 Test runs in terms of innings, the Australia great needing just 68 knocks to achieve the feat. Yet such were the infrequency of Test matches, then played by far fewer countries, it took Bradman more than 19 years to appear in the 45 Tests that yielded those 68 innings.
Published in Daily Times, August 2nd 2018.