Rahul Dravid's 99th test for India

Well, Rahul Dravid did play for the ICC XI, so the Wankhede test isn't his 100th test for India. Earlier this season, Kumble reached 100 tests, as did Ponting. A few days ago, Murali got there. Simon Hughes wrote a nice article in The Telegraph after his batting in the Mohali test.

While Kumble and Murali took 5 wicket hauls in their 100th test, no one really took notice of it. But Cricinfo has a separate page on centuries scored in the 100th test. I hope they can put up a page on 5fer hauls in 100th test by bowlers as well. If we take the most centuries and most five wicket hauls, we see that except for Murali [who is a genius, a freak, a chucker or a weak team bully, depending on your point of view], the rest of the 5 wicket haul chaps are closely bunched together. Take the top 10 entries in both lists. We find that 292 centuries have been scored by those ten batsmen and 302 five wicket hauls by the ten bowlers. It does seem to suggest that scoring a century and taking a five wicket haul are about equally difficult.

In any case, I was digressing. Dravid has now given more or less identical interviews with Cricinfo, The Hindu and Deccan Herald on the occasion of his 100th test. But the single line which makes me pronounce him as real class is this

To have played with some great cricketers is really special - Srinath, Ganguly, Tendulkar, Kumble, Laxman, Sehwag, now Bhajji, people like Azharuddin ... I'm sure I'm missing out some names here.

Leave alone the other names. The fact that he mentioned a personal favourite, Azhar, was really touching. I can't think of any other current cricketer who'd say anything nice about Azhar on record.

Previous plaudits for Dravid on this blog.