Ahead of his 100th Test, Ishant Sharma prioritises 'winning' over personal milestones

Veteran pacer Ishant Sharma is all set to feature in his 100th Test match for Team India as the hosts will be locking horns with England in the all-important third Test match that will be played under lights at Ahmedabad's Motera Stadium on Wednesday.
However, the fast bowler has said that his focus remains on helping the team win.

'I just play to win': Ishant Sharma

"If your career is 14 years long and you are still playing, you cannot name just one highlight. It is difficult to pinpoint just one highlight, every sportsperson has the graph going up and down. I cannot say about that one thing that took my graph or brought it down. Obviously, it feels great to be playing 100 Tests, I learn a lot from Zaheer Khan, I learned from his work ethic. I have told everyone playing in the team that if you keep on working on your fitness, the rewards will come," said Ishant during a virtual press conference on Monday.

Meanwhile, the lanky pacer has made it clear that numbers and personal milestones do not matter to him as he only plays to win.

"When I went to Australia in 2007-08 in Australia, I was just a youngster and I was just focusing on bowling. I did not think much, as we bowl in domestic cricket, I just followed the same. Over the years, I learned by being in different situations. I have always had this motive in making the team win, till the day I play, I will play with the same motive. Personal milestones can be there, when you are about to leave your career you can see these milestones. But these are just numbers for me, I do not play for numbers, I just play to win," he added.

Ishant Sharma's illustrious Test career

Ishant had made his Test debut under the leadership of Rahul Dravid in the 2007/08 season and he has bowled some memorable spells like the one against England at Lord's in 2014 as he finished with figures of 7-74 where India registered a Test win at the 'Mecca of Cricket after a long wait of 28 years. 

The ongoing four-match Test series has been a special one for the Delhi cricketer so far. While he is set to play his 100th game, he became the third Indian pacer to take 300 wickets in Test cricket earlier in the series. Overall, he became the sixth Indian to do so.

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Third Test to be a D/N affair

The third Test match will be played under lights with the pink-ball. This will be the second time that India will be hosting the pink-ball Test match and third overall. Their first Day-Night Test was against Bangladesh at the iconic Eden Gardens in November 2019 where they had registered a comprehensive win.

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However, the Men In Blue's second Test match under lights which was also their first one overseas turned out to be a forgettable one as they tasted bitter defeat at the hands of Australia in December 2020 where Virat Kohli & Co. ended up registering their lowest-ever Test score of 36. Coming back to the India-England series, currently, the four-match Test series is leveled at 1-1. After suffering a humiliating 227-run loss in the series opener at the MA Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai last week, a determined Indian team staged a remarkable comeback in the second Test match at the same venue to hand a mammoth 317-run defeat to the visitors.

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(With ANI Inputs)