Yesterday marked the end of an era in cricket as one of the most prolific fast bowlers of all time, Dale Steyn pulled the plug on his cricketing career.
Despite not being officially retired, Steyn was last seen in action in 2020 when he appeared for a T20 against Australia at Johannesburg. He entered into a whirlwind of decline towards the latter part of his career, mainly due to frequent injuries. However, with all said and done, he still managed to post figures which were downright enviable.
The impressive legacy left behind by Dale Steyn
In his glittering antiquity, he played 93 Test matches, from which he managed to claim 439 wickets at an overwhelming strike rate of 42.30 and an astonishing bowling average of 22.
He was equally impressive in One Dayers as he managed to bag 196 wickets from 125 matches at a brilliant economy rate of 4.87.
A magic that could have been
A Twitter user posted an interesting supposition on the micro-blogging site claiming that if Steyn had bowled the similar number of balls that James Anderson has bowled in his career, Steyn could have easily surpassed Muttiah Muralitharan in the number of Test wickets.
Going by the stat, if Steyn had continued with his aggressive strike rate of 42 in Test matches and he would have bowled 35490 deliveries, he could have easily bagged 839 wickets. Once again, let us clarify that this is a supposition post and can definitely not be real.
If Dale Steyn had bowled as many deliveries in Test cricket as James Anderson (35,490) with his own strike-rate (42.30), Steyn would have 839 wickets.
— Stephan Shemilt (@stephanshemilt) August 31, 2021
The highest wicket in Test cricket is the Sri Lankan legend, Muttiah Muralitharan, who has managed to bag 800 Test wickets. The man who is in the second position is the Australian icon, Shane Warne.
Going by the stat shared in the aforementioned tweet, Dale Steyn would have ruled the world with the highest number of wickets. The man left behind an unparalleled legacy in the echelons of South Africa as he drew the curtain on a glittering cricket career.
