Harbhajan takes 400th Test wicket

Jul 08, 2011 |

Roseau (Dominica)

Tags:

Indian off-spinner Harbhajan Singh became the 11th player to take 400 Test wickets on Thursday.

Harbhajan, playing in his 96th Test, reached the milestone in the afternoon session of the second day of the third Test against West Indies when he bowled Carlton Baugh.

The 31-year-old is the third Indian player to break the 400-wicket barrier, following Anil Kumble (619) and Kapil Dev (434), although he is still a long way off the all-time record of 800 held by Sri Lankan spin legend Muttiah Muralitharan.

"Bhaji just took his 400th test wicket!! What a milestone!! Proud moment for your friends and family! proud of you mr singh," wrote non-playing team-mate Yuvraj Singh on Twitter.

Harbhajan, a member of India's World Cup-winning squad this year, has always been a combative player.

In March 2001, he collected 32 wickets in three Tests against Australia, including the first Test hat-trick by an Indian, while none of his team-mates managed more than three.

Harbhajan, whose Test best is 8-84, worked his way up to stardom after starting as a nervous, fidgeting 18-year-old, and having to endure doubts over his talent and abilities.

But despite his talent, controversy has never been far away.

His confrontation with Australian Andrew Symonds in 2008 led to one of the ugliest controversies in cricket -- he was initially charged with a racial insult, which was reduced to a charge of abuse on appeal.

Later that year, he was banned for 11 matches during the inaugural Indian Premier League season for slapping his India team-mate Shanthakumaran Sreesanth before the full glare of TV cameras.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/83780" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd></li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-91237b031c053981d194c9258d49cf89" value="form-91237b031c053981d194c9258d49cf89" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="85419260" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>