Sri Lanka's Malinda Pushpakumara joins the 1000-wicket club

Left-arm spinner Malinda Pushpakumara has become the fourth Sri Lankan to take 1000 first-class wickets, following in the footsteps of Muthiah Muralidaran (1374), Rangana Herath (1080) and Dinuka Hettiarachchi (1001).

Pushpakumara, 38, last represented Sri Lanka in 2018; he achieved the feat while playing for Badureliya Sports Club against Moors Sports Club in the Sri Lanka Major League three-day tournament. Pushpakumara, who had started the game on 998 wickets, ended with match figures of 7 for 137 as Badureliya won by an innings and 46 runs.

Moors' Pasindu Sooriyabandara was Pushpakumara's 1000th victim, clean bowled on the final morning of the three-day match.

Pushpakumara became the 218th player to reach the 1000-wicket milestone in first-class cricket and one of just three active players to do so; Simon Harmer achieved it last year and James Anderson did so in 2021. The next closest is Australia's Nathan Lyon, who has 860 first-class wickets.

Having made his first-class debut in November 2006, Pushpakumara has played 173 matches, taking 86 five-wicket hauls and 10 wickets in a game on 28 occasions. He also boasts the best first-class figures in Sri Lanka: 10 for 37 for Colombo Cricket Club in 2019. He was only the second Sri Lankan to have achieved the feat after Pramodya Wickramasinghe.

Across the span of his 20-year domestic career, Pushpakumara topped the domestic wickets charts on several occasions, though his Test career was short-lived, primarily owing to much of it overlapping with that of Muralidaran and then Herath. He played four Tests between 2017 and 2018 and took 14 wickets at an average of 37.14.