5 Test bowlers with most top order wickets

Who has taken the most wickets of top order batsmen who batted from position 1 to 3 in test cricket? It is said that in Test cricket opening bowlers set the platform on the opening day for their teams by castling opposition teams top-order batsmen early.But for that you need to have the skill of either moving the ball with the hand or off the pitch or spinning the ball right from the start of an innings. Some bowlers have developed that habit of picking up top-order batsmen regularly throughout out their careers in Test cricket.These wickets are possibly the most important in a Test innings, because once the first three wickets are down, the batting team is merely trying for a respectable total rather than a dominating one.Here, we have presented 5 Test bowlers with most top-order (1-3) wickets.

#5 Anil Kumble - 173 Wickets

He is the only Indian bowler who has taken all 10 wickets in an innings
of a Test match

Unlike his contemporaries Murali and Warne, Kumble was not a big turner of the ball, he rather relied much on pace and accuracy. His ability to make the ball bounce with subtle variations in pace made him a tough bowler to face for the batsmen; thus earning him the sobriquet "Jumbo".

He had played 132 Test matches for India in which he had taken 619 wickets. He had troubled many top-order batsmen and his favourite bunnies among top-order batsmen (1-3) were Sri Lanka’s Roshan Mahanama and South Africa’s Andrew Hudson; Kumble had got out both on 7 occasions.

He had taken 175 wickets of top-order batsmen out of his total career 619 wickets. Kumble holds the record of bowling 40850 balls in his entire Test career, which is highest for an Indian and second highest overall.

Here is a table that shows Kumble’s top 5 bunnies in Test cricket.

Player name	Country	No.of innings played against Anil Kumble	No.of times out against Anil Kumble
Adam Gilchrist	Australia	26	9
Inzamam-ul-Haq	Pakistan	18	8
Roshan Mahanama	Sri Lanka	17	7
Aravinda de Silva	Sri Lanka	18	7
Andrew Hudson	South Africa	20	7