Melbourne, January 13: Former Pakistan captain Waqar Younis believes Mitchell Johnson has it in him to surpass pace legend Wasim Akram as the game’s most successful left-arm fast bowler.
Waqar said he had ”no doubt” that Johnson would go past Akram’s record of 414 Test wickets and the Australian just needs to maintain his fitness levels.
Johnson has been leading the Australian pace attack for quite some time now and the national selectos have kept their faith on him.
Johnson (142 Test wickets from 31 Tests) has a long way to go to be spoken of in the same league as Akram, who was the best left-arm quick of all time and tormented the world’s top batsmen for 17 years.
But the 28-year-old Johnson has a strike rate of a wicket every 51.88 balls – superior to Wasim’s career strike rate of 54.65.
”Nobody is better than Wasim but I have no doubt that if Johnson stays fit he will take more than 400 Test wickets, maybe a fair bit more,” Waqar said.
”Johnson’s record is superb and I think it shows he will have a great Test career.
”He is probably at his best right now but there is no reason he can’t play for another five or six years, which will means he will take a lot of Test wickets,” Waqar was quoted as saying by ‘The Courier Mail’.
Johnson international career picked up a rapid pace and he needs only 45 more wickets to knock off Alan Davidson (186 Test wickets) as Australia’s most successful left-arm fast bowler.
He will then have only Akram, Sri Lanka’s Chaminda Vaas (355 Test wickets) and Indian quick Zaheer Khan (220) ahead of him in Test cricket’s elite left-arm pace club.
——-Agencies