Adelaide: Joe Root on Saturday became the fourth player in history to write 1,600 tests running in one calendar year – and the first since 2008 – but the Virgin Ages in Australia again avoided it.
The England captain has been in a brilliant form in 2021, arriving for ash with 1,455 running from 12 tests, including six centuries, an average of 66.13.
But the 30-year-old player never had a good fortune on Australia’s land.
He approached the prime century in the country in the first test in Brisbane, making 89, and saw a good nick on the second test day and night in Adelaide before he raised Cameron Green to Steve Smith to fall to 62.
The roots, however wrote another chapter What’s extraordinary, join a little elite to make 1,600 tests running in a calendar year.
Only Mohammad Yousuf (1,788 run in Pakistan (1,788 run in 2006), West India Legend Viv Richards (1,710 Run in 1976) and former South African captain Graeme Smith (1,656 in 2008) has made more.
Root is currently on 1,606 with the second half in Adelaide and then the third test in Melbourne will still come this year.
Yorkshireman admitted before leaving for Australia that he had been “desperate” to succeed in a country where he had managed only 570 runs, without a hundred, even -Rata 38, ahead of the current tour.
“I think I might really want it, I’m too desperate, and it might have a negative impact on the way I play, I put too much pressure on myself,” he said.