Recently, the Sri Lankan left-arm spinner Malinda Pushpakumara claimed the joint 13th best bowling figure in the first-class cricket history after imitating Jim Laker and Anil Kumble’s rare 10-wicket haul achievement in an innings.
Playing for Colombo Cricket Club in the Sri Lankan domestic cricket (Premier League Tournament Tier A), the 31-year-old left-arm spinner achieved a bowling figure of 18.4-5-37-10 against Saracens Sports Club in the fourth innings of the game.
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Saracens had to chase 349 runs in the fourth innings to win that game but Saracens were all-out for just 113 runs where Pushpakumara bagged all the ten wickets of that innings. With the help of his bowling, Colombo CC easily won the game by 235 runs.
Here are some important stats of Malinda Pushpakumara’s 10/37
- Best bowling figure by a Sri Lankan bowler in first-class cricket history. The previous record was 10/41 by the right-arm pacer Pramodya Wickramasinghe (Sinhalese Sports Club) against Kalutara Public Cricket Club at Colombo 1991/92.
- Fourth best bowling figure by an Asian bowler in first-class cricket history.
- The fifth bowler to claim 10 wickets in a first-class cricket innings in the 21st century.
- Joint 13th best bowling figure in the first-class cricket history.
The left-arm spinner Pushpakumara bagged a total of 16 wickets in that game as he had a bowling figure of 29-7-73-6 during Saracens Sports Club’s first innings.
Pushpakumara is an international cricketer for Sri Lanka who has played four Tests and two ODIs after making his international cricket debut in August 2017.
Also, in the same game, another left-arm spinner Chamikara Edirisinghe for Saracens Sports Club was very close to achieving the 10-wicket haul in one innings. During the first innings of that game, the 27-year-old Edirisinghe picked up nine wickets as he had a bowling figure of 26-1-87-9. That bowling effort forced Colombo to get all out on 238 runs.
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In reply, Saracens were bundled out for just 169 runs. Starting their second innings with 69 runs lead, Colombo managed to score 279/5 before their declaration. Colombo set a fourth-innings target of 349 runs but Saracens failed to chase that.
