Rangana Herath reaches 300 Test wickets

Rangana Herath’s 300^th Test wicket was Steven Finn

Sri Lankan bowler Rangana Herath reached 300 wickets in Tests after picking Steven Finn on day two of the second Test against England. The 38-year-old who has been the backbone of Sri Lanka's spin attack following Muttiah Muralitharan's exit, has taken 16 years to reach the landmark.

After dismissing Alex Hales on the same day, Herath went past English spinner Derek Underwood's record for second most number of wickets in Tests by a left-arm spinner after the Kiwi star Daniel Vettori.

Herath remained wicketless at the end of the first day, giving away 74 runs in 24 overs at stumps. He was also impressive against Leicestershire during the practice match, picking two wickets at an economy of 1.63. He had scored 55 runs and made a 174-run eight wicket partnership with opener Dasun Sanaka.

He has had a similar career as Underwood, who fell short of three wickets to reach 300 in his career that spanned around 15 years. 

The veteran cricketer broke into the international scene in 1999 at Galle, debuting against Australia. With his mysterious bowling action, he confused the batsmen and scalped six wickets. Herath had retired from limited-overs cricket in January this year. 

He has been a crucial bowler in this series as England batsmen have been struggling against spinners. 

Muralitharan tops the list of most number of wickets (795) for Sri Lanka, followed by Chaminda Vaas (355). Herath is third on the list and below him stands the deadly pacer Lasith Malinga

The southpaw is also one of the senior-most players in the current Sri Lankan side after the retirements of  bigwigs like Mahela Jayawardene and Kumar Sangakkara. The team has been struggling with several new faces and have been trying to rebuild the team after a humiliating defeat in the Asia Cup and World T20 earlier this year.

Sri Lanka continued their poor run in the first Test at Hendingley, and they were uprooted by an innings and 88 runs. Kusal Mendes' 53 was the highest in Sri Lanka's two innings and the top-order had crashed on both the occasions. The ace pacer James Anderson plundered the Sri Lankan line-up with his 10/45, which is his second best figures in Tests.

England, choosing to bat first in the second Test, have posted 498 runs in the first innings after staggering performances from Moeen Ali, Joe Root and Alex Hales, and Sri Lanka are already six wickets down.