Nathan Lyon had to wait 11 months to finally snare his 400th Test wicket but Australia’s off-spinning GOAT finally got the monkey off his back on Saturday and celebrated by triggering their First Ashes Test triumph over England at the Gabba.
The 34-year-old was relieved to at long last chalk up the milestone and he proceeded to clean up England in a spell of 4-22 which kept Australia’s run-chase to a meagre 20 on day four.
“It’s been a long time coming. It was pretty amazing to get that breakthrough,” he said.
“It was just one of those mornings. I honestly felt like the ball came out well yesterday but I didn’t have much luck.”
“It hasn’t really hit me yet, to be honest. I don’t doubt I’ll get my phone, and call my family and friends, and that’ll hit a little bit closer to home. It’s something that I’m very proud of, there’s no doubt about that. It’s been some hard toil to get it, but it’s very rewarding, that’s for sure.”
He became just the third Australian cricketer to take 400 Test wickets after removing Dawid Malan for 82 on day four.
He joined spin king Shane Warne (708) and legendary paceman Glenn McGrath (563) as the nation’s only players who have achieved the feat.
Playing his 101st Test since his debut in Sri Lanka in 2011, the 34-year-old NSW tweaker was swamped by his teammates and given a raucous reception from the Gabba crowd when he conjured up his milestone wicket as England slumped to 3/223 after trailing by 278 on the first innings following Australia’s 425.
“Because I’m not so much on personal milestones and I’ve got a lot of my best mates in that change room, they tend to remind me and ask me if I was gonna have the 400 on my shoes like Pidge [McGrath] or run around like Warnie, so I had a lot of banter going on.
“I’m one for saying the next wicket is always the hardest one to get, and that’s not going to change. It was a big relief.”
Lyon had gone agonisingly close to picking up his 400th early in the second session of day three when the left-handed Malan, on eight at the time, left a straight one from the spinner bowling around the wicket, which missed the off bail by a matter of centimetres.
Malan admitted in an ABC Grandstand interview after day three that he gloved one off Lyon when he was on 37 so it was poetic justice that Lyon finally hunted down his prey.
It has ARRIVED!
FOUR HUNDRED Test wickets for Nathan Lyon ????#Ashes pic.twitter.com/MScc2e4xAy
— 7Cricket (@7Cricket) December 10, 2021
Lyon told Fox Cricket he asked umpire Rod Tucker at the time of the incident “but he gave me nothing”..
“It was only Josh Hazlewood at mid-on that asked do you want to go upstairs. But I thought the guys square of the wicket might have seen something different. It is pretty hard especially front on if it just nicks the glove. But that’s the way cricket guys and you have to make your own luck sometimes.”
He was only needed for nine overs in the first innings, going wicketless as pace trio Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc and Josh Hazlewood ran riot as the tourists were rolled for 147.
England have been a favoured opponent for Lyon with 89 of his Test scalps coming in 24 Ashes contests, second only on his list of preferred rivals behind India – he’s taken 94 wickets against them from 22 matches.
His best figures of 8-50 came against India in the Second Test at Bengaluru in 2017, one of 18 times he’s taken a five-wicket haul in an innings. He’s taken 10 wickets in a match on three occasions, most recently against New Zealand in Sydney last year.
Lyon is also only the 17th player – one of only seven spinners – in men’s Test cricket history to join the 400 club, joining some of the biggest names in the history of the game.
All-time record holder, Sri Lankan icon Muttiah Muralitharan (800), Indian leg-spinner Anil Kumble (619), Windies pacemen Courtney Walsh (519) and Curtly Ambrose (405), as well as England duo James Anderson (632) and Stuart Broad (524), who were controversially omitted from the team to face Australia in the series opener, are among those in the exclusive club.
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