Anil Kumble reflects on his ten-for and bowling with a broken jaw

Speaking to DNA's G Krishnan on the 25th anniversary of his Test debut, Anil Kumble looks back at his career, relives his highs and lows and speaks about the changes in the game from the perspective of a cricket administrator.

A team-mate of yours nearly completed 25 years playing international cricket. Would you have preferred a similar way, though your body has taken a toll between 1990 and 2008? Oh no. Eighteen years itself felt like a lot more than 18 years. Hats off to Sachin Tendulkar for having that kind of longevity in international cricket. To me, 18 years was pretty hard on the body and by the time I finished, it was quite challenging to go out there and bowl.

It is a dream for anyone to have a career that coincided with such great cricketers. Rahul (Dravid), Sachin, (VVS) Laxman, Sourav (Ganguly), Sri (Javagal Srinath) at my time and people finishing their careers - Kapil (Dev), Ravi (Shastri), (Md) Azharuddin, a whole lot of people who I managed to play with. I saw an era of three generations in Indian cricket as I went along. It's been really fantastic to have played alongside cricketers who are now possibly slowly getting to the later part of their careers.

And of course, your 10 wickets in an innings (10/74 vs Pakistan in New Delhi, 1999) and you bowled with a broken jaw in the West Indies in 2002 will never be forgotten.

I don't think they were all planned. I was destined to get 10 wickets. And the jaw was something that I always felt 'if my shoulder was fine, I would try to bowl'. That's all. And my shoulder was fine. It was quite painful, though. The thought of getting injured again and not having to play a part perhaps made me go there and bowl."