Ashwin is a great motivation for me: Yasir Shah

Pakistan leg-spinner Yasir Shah etched his name in the history books when he bowled West Indies’ Miguel Cummins yesterday. Bowling in the first innings, Shah bagged 5/121 to be the pick of the bowlers. En route his 5 wickets, he reached the 100-wickets milestone in Test cricket. With that, Yasir became the joint second fastest to take 100 wickets in Tests.

It took him 17 matches to complete the tally of 100 Test wickets. Soon after he reached the milestone, Indian ace spinner Ravichandran Ashwin had a word of praise for him. Ashwin is currently the number one ranked Test bowler. He took to micro-blogging site Twitter to wish his Pakistan counterpart. In a very friendly tweet, Ashwin congratulated the leggie.

He tweetd, “Just a little late I guess, but very well done @Shah64Y double it up now.” The legspinner acknowledged the tweet and was very delighted to receive the tweet. Talking after the day’s play to the media, Yasir Shah said he is thankful to Ashwin for wishing him good luck. “Yes, he had said good luck so I am thankful,” quoted Shah.

He further added that it is always a motivation to see a bowler of great caliber wishing good luck. He mentioned that Ashwin is a great bowler and was second quickest to 200 wickets. He quoted, “It’s naturally motivating when a great bowler who is second fastest to 200 tweets a good luck message and it’s really a great motivation for me.”

Also read – Stats: Bowlers fastest to 100 wickets in Test cricket

Earlier, prior to the commencement of the day-night Test between Pakistan and West Indies, Ashwin had wished good luck to Yasir on Twitter. He had tweeted then, “Good luck, may the force be with him. He is such a delight to watch.”

Speaking further about the healthy competition the two players have, Shah mentioned that every Indian and Pakistani player wish to play against each other. However, due to political tensions between the two countries, a Test match between India and Pakistan seems like a far cry for now. “Every Pakistani and Indian player has this wish to play against each other,” remarked Shah.

Yasir Shah pointed out that he is yet to play a Test against India and would like to play soon. “I have not played a Test against India so it’s my wish,” he added.

Both Shah and Ashwin are impact players. The duo have come face-to-face just one till date. They met during the India-Pakistan clash at Adelaide during the ICC Cricket World Cup 2015. Ashwin had bagged one wicket on the occasion and Shah couldn’t add any to his name.

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