India v England: ‘Remarkable’ James Anderson seals 700th Test wicket - ‘Up there with the greats’

James Anderson claimed his 700-wicket milestone in Dharamshala on Saturday in England’s fifth Test against India.

The landmark moment came in India’s second innings on day three, as the 41-year-old dismissed Kuldeep Yadav with a short ball which the Indian batsman edged behind.

Former England captain Sir Alastair Cook labelled the legendary seam bowler “extraordinary” as he became the first pace bowler to reach 700 Test wickets.

"It is a superb achievement," Cook told TNT Sports. "His hunger to get better and win games of cricket for England is unbelievable.

“The physical challenges he has overcome to be able to play nearly 190 Test matches is a joke and his skill is a joke.

“His control of length is extraordinary,” Cook added. “We talk about his skill and his ability to swing the ball, he’s worked on the wobble seam. But one thing he has got above every other seam bowler is that he never misses length.

“When you face him as a batter, the unrelenting pressure he can create on you is extraordinary.”

Steven Finn claimed his former England team-mate Anderson is “up there with the greats of the game”.

“His 700th Test wicket. When you say it, because he’s doing it live in front of our faces you think it’s just normality. This is not normality that we’re watching,” Finn told TNT Sports.

“His career started relatively slowly and it took him five years to take his 100th Test wicket, but as he became more experienced and that leader of the attack, those milestones just kept on rolling in.

“You see the frequency of how he moved from 200 [wickets] to 500 in seven years. That’s a lot of wickets in seven years, just the consistency and skill.

“The thing that stands out about James when I’ve played with him is he was never satisfied or happy with the bowler that he is at that present moment, he never rested on his laurels.

“That’s why he’s up there with some of the greats of the game, remarkable really.”

Anderson’s 700th test wicket came 21 years after his first at Lord’s in 2003, as he became only the third player in history to reach the number.

Only spin bowlers Muttiah Muralitharan of Sri Lanka and Shane Warne of Australia have more Test wickets, with 800 and 708 respectively.

Anderson’s former England team-mate Stuart Broad is the closest pace bowler on the list, who managed 604 wickets before his retirement last summer.

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