With knocks of 143 and 103, Root’s tally of Test runs has reached 12377 in 265 innings across 145 Tests at an average of 50.93.Tendulkar finished his career with a mountain of 15921 runs in 329 innings, averaging 53.78. He played 200 Tests.
With still 3-4 years of cricket left in him, the England batsmans’ proximity to Tendulkar’s Test record has given rise to the obvious question — will Root go past Tendulkar?
Standing just 95 runs behind Cook to become England’s top Test scorer of all time, Root is currently seventh on the list of leading run-getters in red-ball international cricket.
In a video clip of Root’s interview shared by England Cricket on X (formerly Twitter), the caption read: “Half an eye on Sachin’s record, Joe?”
In his reply, the former England captain said: “I just want to play and try and do my bit for the team and score the runs as many as I can and see where we get to. But there’s no better feeling. It’s obviously amazing when you score a hundred; you’d be lying if you said it wasn’t. (It is) a big part of why you start playing the game and what you love about it,” said Root in a video shared by England Cricket.
“But there’s no better feeling than winning a Test match. So the more it can affect games and the more you can add to the team, the greater it is. So that will be the main focus. And hopefully more days like this will come with that mentality,” he added.
Looking at the form the England great has been in over the past few years, Root is looking primed to go past Tendulkar if he maintains his consistency and fitness.
Before the end of this year, England have six more Tests lined up — three against Pakistan and as many against New Zealand.