Joe Root Becomes 15th England Player To Play 100 Or More Tests

England Test captain, Joe Root became the 15th player to make his 100th Test appearance for England when he took the field on Friday against India in Chennai. Former captain, Sir Alastair Cook has played most Tests for the Three Lions with 161 Test caps. Legendary pacer, James Anderson is three matches behind Cook making his 158th appearance.

Joe Root, 30, is the fourth-leading Test run-scorer for England with 8249 runs – before the start of the Chennai Test – as Alastair Cook sits at the top with 12472 runs. The right-hander made his Test debut in 2012 at Nagpur in England’s victorious Test series over India – it was also the last time India lost a Test series at home. He scored a promising 73 from 229 balls in his debut Test innings.

Joe Root aims for a Test series victory in India

Now, Root, grown from a wonder-kid to a man, has come to India leading his troops, to repeat Alastair Cook’s feat. It would be a massive task if Root’s team can upscale India, who have lost just a solitary Test at home in 9 years.

After not making a single Test ton in 2020, the Yorkshireman has gained freakish form in Sri Lanka – he scored 426 runs at an average of 106 as England whitewash the Islanders before taking on Virat Kohli’s side.

Of late, the right-hander has had issues of converting his fifties to three-figure scores. In 2018,2019,2020, he went past the half-century mark 18 times but could reach a hundred only 4 times.

However, after his double hundred and a hundred on the raging turners in Galle, the English skipper takes on India in a 4-Test series and carry massive expectations. Also, Root, unlike most overseas players of the past and present, has an astonishing record in Asia – he averages 54.50 in Asia with the bat compared to his overall average of 49.46.

Joe Root has a very important year coming up, as a batsman and a captain, as England is scheduled to play 9 Test matches against Virat Kohli’s team – 4 away and 5 at home – along with a high-octane Ashes in Australia later in the year.

The highly skilful batsman is also a key member of England’s ODI side – he averages 50.10 with 5962 runs in the 50-over format and was part of the 2019 World Cup-winning team at home. However, Root is not in Eoin Morgan’s T20 team anymore.

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