Joe Root cemented England’s position of dominance at Headingley with an authoritative sixth Test hundred of the year in front of an adoring home crowd.
Root’s fourth century of the year against India took the England captain towards and past a number of records that highlight his growing standing among the game’s all-time greats.
His 2021 century tally now stands at six; no English batsman has ever recorded more in a calendar year. Only Mohammad Yousuf, Ricky Ponting, Viv Richards, Aravinda de Silva and Sachin Tendulkar have scored more in a single year. With five Tests to go for Root in 2021 – assuming the Ashes go ahead as currently planned – Root is 405 runs behind Yousuf’s record-breaking tally of 1,788 runs in a calendar year. Given he is averaging 69.90 this year, he stands a decent chance of getting there.
As well as hurtling towards a set of records, Root is also dispelling the criticism that stalked him for so long – the infrequency with which he converted fifties into hundreds. In 2021, Root has passed 50 seven times, on six of those occasions he has also reached three figures.
On Sky’s coverage, former England captain Nasser Hussain posed the question as to whether Root is his country’s greatest ever Test batsman. The numbers put forward a compelling case. Root’s former captain Alastair Cook is the only Englishman with more Test runs and more Test hundreds than the Yorkshireman. Of the 12 English batsmen to have scored 7,000 Test runs, Wally Hammond – who played his last Test in 1947 – is the only person other than Root to average 50 in Test cricket.
With every passing Test, Root’s overall career record compares increasingly favourably with some of the game’s undisputed greats. Root is one of five batsmen to have scored more 7,000 Test runs with an average between 50 and 51. The other four? AB de Villiers, Allan Border, Viv Richards and Matthew Hayden. He is in excellent company.
And given his current trajectory, who is to say that he won’t improve on that? Root began 2021 with his Test average marginally below 48 – it’s improved by 2.39 runs per dismissal in the space of eight months.
Root has achieved all this in an era in which England have rarely been a settled side. Since his debut in 2012, Root is only English batsman to average over 41. And given the era he plays in – where ball generally dominates bat – and where he plays the majority of his Tests, his numbers are even more impressive. His place among the greats is no longer in doubt.
