England's Joe Root etched his name in cricketing history on Sunday, August 3, by becoming the undisputed king of home Test matches. With a sublime century
in the second innings of the fifth Test against India at The Oval, Root now holds the record for the most Test hundreds scored on home soil - a staggering 24!
The former England skipper surpassed all-time greats Ricky Ponting, Jacques Kallis, and Mahela Jayawardene, who each had 23 Test centuries at home. Root reached the milestone in style, nudging a couple of runs off Akash Deep's bowling in the 69th over of England's second innings, triggering loud applause from the Oval crowd.
That wasn't the only milestone the Yorkshireman hit. Root also overtook England legend Jack Hobbs to claim the record for most Test centuries by an Englishman against a single opponent. Hobbs scored 12 tons against Australia; Root now has 13 centuries to his name against India.
In fact, only the legendary Don Bradman stands ahead of Root in that particular list, with 19 Test centuries against England. What makes Root's feat even more impressive is that 10 of those 13 tons have come at home - more than any batter in history has managed against one team in home Tests.
The century also boosted Root's overall tally to 39 in Test cricket, pushing him to fourth on the all-time list. He trails only Sachin Tendulkar (51), Jacques Kallis (45), and Ricky Ponting (41) - elite company for one of England's finest ever batters.
To top it all off, Root also became the first cricketer to surpass 6000 runs in the World Test Championship (WTC), and the only batter to score 500+ runs in a Test series against India on three separate occasions. Previously, only five players-Weekes, Sobers, Abbas, Younis, and Ponting-had done it twice.
With every outing, Joe Root continues to redefine greatness in the red-ball format - and Sunday was yet another reminder of why he's one of the modern-day greats of the game.
