India spinner R Ashwin has added a fresh feather into his already illustrious cap as he scalped his 500th first-class wicket during the first day of the second Test against West Indies at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad on Friday.
Ashwin provided India with the first breakthrough of the day as he got rid of opener Kieron Powell for 22. With that, Ashwin completed 500 wickets in his 107th first-class match.
The tweaker is the fourth fastest Indian bowler — in terms of matches — to go past the mark of 500 in first-class cricket. Ashwin is only behind former greats Amar Singh, Padmakar Shivalkar and Vaman Kumar in this list.
90 - Amar Singh
103 - Padmakar Shivalkar
106 - Vaman Kumar
107 - Ravichandran Ashwin
110 - Subhash Gupte / Bhagwat Chandrasekhar
112 - Erapalli Prasanna / Anil Kumble
The ongoing Hyderabad Test is Ashwin’s 64th outing in the longest format and so far, he has scalped 334 wickets.
Meanwhile, Ashwin is within touching distance of another milestone in the ongoing clash against Windies. Before the start of the Hyderabad Test, Ashwin had picked up 57 wickets from 10 Test matches against them and is the sixth most successful Indian bowler against the Caribbean team.
{{/usCountry}}Meanwhile, Ashwin is within touching distance of another milestone in the ongoing clash against Windies. Before the start of the Hyderabad Test, Ashwin had picked up 57 wickets from 10 Test matches against them and is the sixth most successful Indian bowler against the Caribbean team.
{{/usCountry}}The Chennai-based tweaker can enter the top five in Hyderabad if he takes 6 wickets in the match — he already has one wicket to his name and needs five more.