Muttiah Muralitharan is perhaps the greatest bowler to have ever played in Test Cricket. He has done so well that the best performances of Muttiah Muralitharan cannot be talked about in one article. He has played 133 Test Matches for Sri Lanka. He has taken 800 Test Wickets which means he averages 6 Wickets per Test Match. He has taken 67 Five Wicket Hauls which is the most in Test Cricket history. He has also taken 10 wickets in a Test Match 22 times. He has an economy rate of just 2.48 throughout his entire career in Test Cricket. He is one of the greatest Sri Lankan Cricketers of all time.
Let’s look at the Top 5 Best Bowling Performances of Muttiah Muralitharan in Test Cricket
1) 7/155 and 9/65 vs England (1998)
This is one of Muralitharan’s best ever bowling performances in a Test Match. He took 16 wickets against England at The Oval. In the first innings he bowled a massive 59.3 overs out of 158 overs that England batted in the first innings. He gave away 155 runs and took 7 wickets in this innings. He made sure that England could only make 445. Then in the second batting innings for England, he bowled 54.2 overs and he only gave away 65 runs and he got 9 wickets in this innings. He was one wicket away from the perfect 10. He only gave away 1.20 runs per over. Sri Lanka won this test match by a whopping 10 wickets. He had a total match figures of 16 wickets for 220 runs.
2) 9/51 vs Zimbabwe (2001)
This is his best bowling performance in a Test innings. He got 9 wickets again in this innings against Zimbabwe. This was the first innings. Zimbabwe batted a total of 97 overs out of which 40 were Bowled by Muttiah Muralitharan. He only gave away 51 runs at 1.28 runs per over. He took 9 wickets. He got the wickets of Andy Flower, Grant Flower and Heath Streak. Zimbabwe were all out for 236 runs. In the second innings of the match he took 4 wickets for 64 runs. Sri Lanka won this match by an innings and 94 runs. Muttiah Muralitharan took a total of 13 wickets in this test match for 115 runs.
3) 6/87 and 7/84 vs South Africa (2000)
This performance against South Africa was one of his best. Muttiah Muralitharan had become feared across the world by this time. Sri Lanka made 522 while batting first. South Africa were all out for 238 In the first innings. Muttiah Muralitharan took 6 wickets for 87 runs. He bowled 41 overs in this innings. He gave away runs at 2.12 runs per over. He got out Gary Kirsten, Jacques Kallis, Jonty Rhodes in the first innings. Then in the second innings, he took 7 wickets for 84 runs in 35 overs that he bowled. He took 13 wickets in the match for 171 runs. He took the wickets of Mark Boucher and Shaun Pollock in the second innings. Sri Lanka won this match by an innings and 15 runs.
4) 8/87 vs India (2001)
This was one of his best bowling performances against India. This was in 2001 and it was the first innings of the match. Muttiah Muralitharan bowled 34.1 overs in which he took 8 wickets of the Indian innings and he gave away 87 runs at 2.55 runs per over. He got the wickets of Rahul Dravid, Sourav Ganguly. He also took 3 wickets in the second innings of this match as he bowled 46.5 overs and gave away 109 runs. He took 11 wickets in this match and Sri Lanka won this test match by an innings and 77 Runs.
5) 6/126 and 5/44 vs West Indies (2001)
2001 was a year that was historic for Muttiah Muralitharan as he was tearing apart the best batting line-ups in the world one after the other. In this match he single handedly tore apart the great West Indies batting line-up. In the first innings of this match, he took 6 wickets for 126 runs. He bowled 53.4 overs in this match. He has an economy rate of 2.35 in this innings. He got the wickets of Ramnaresh Sarwan, Brian Lara, Carl Hooper, Marlon Samuels in the first innings. In the second batting innings for the West Indies, he took 5 wickets for 44 runs in 31.3 overs. He had an economy rate of 1.40. Due to his 11 wickets in this match for 170 runs, Sri Lanka won this match by 10 wickets.
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