Former Indian captain and Team India’s current head coach, Rahul Dravid turned 49, as he celebrates his birthday today, January 11. Famously known as ‘the wall’ for his unmatchable perseverance to stand tall against the opponent and for turning the tide in India’s favour, Rahul Dravid has played 164 Tests,  344 ODIs and one T20 international with 24,208  overseas runs to his name. He is listed as one of the best middle order batsman and slip fielder. So, on this special day of the legendary cricketer, let us have a look at the 10 best records of his career:

1.   Maximum number of catches in a Test Cricket

When it came to slip fielding, Dravid totally aced it leaving no loopholes for the opponent batsman. In overall  format of  cricket, Dravid has 336 catches in his hands out of which 210 are from Test cricket. It’s the most by a fielder in the Test format. He ranks fourth on the list for overall catches after Mahela Jayawardene (440), Ricky Ponting (364) and Jacques Kallis (338)

 

2.  Highest number of balls faced

Standing true to his title,‘ the wall’ Rahul Dravid has faced the highest number of deliveries in his Test career of 16 years. He has faced 31,258 balls during his Test Career, with Sachin Tendulkar next to him in line with 29,437 balls

 

3.Longest time spent at the crease

Rahul Dravid also holds the record of spending  735 hours and 52 minutes on the pitch, the maximum by any Test batsman.

4.First batsman with 10000 runs at No 3 in Tests

Relied upon as the most suitable middle order batsman, Rahul Dravid went on to become the first international cricketer to have scored more than 10,000 runs while batting at no.3 position. He has 10,524 runs from 219 innings at an avg. of 52.88 with 28 hundreds and 50 fifities and a highest score of 270.

 5. Only Indian batsman to hit four consecutive centuries in four innings

Rahul Dravid is the only consistent Indian batsman to have scored  hundred in four consecutive innings.  He made his record in 2002 while playing 3 matches against England with scores of 115, 148, 217 and one against West Indies.

6. Rahul Dravid’s Partnership

Tagged as Mr. Dependable, Rahul Dravid has more partnership runs (32,039) than any other batsman in Test Cricket. Dravid has more hundred run partnerships and more fifty run partnerships than any other batsman – 88 and 126 respectively. He was involved in 2^nd most number of partnerships (738) behind Shivnarine Chanderpaul (750) in Test cricket history.

7. Five double centuries in Tests

Rahul Dravid is first amongst the Indian cricketer to achieve the milestone of scoring five double hundreds in Tests with 200 not out against Zimbabwe, 217 against England, 222 against New Zealand, 233 against Australia and 270 against Pakistan.

8. Hundreds against every Test playing nation

With the record of having many firsts, Dravid is the only batsman to have scored centuries in all 10 Test cricket playing nations. England, West Indies, New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and India were the 10 Test playing nations during his career.

9. 50+ score in seven consecutive tests

In 2006, Rahul Dravid entered a new record club of scoring at least a fifty in seven consecutive Tests surpassing  the previous Indian record of 50+ scores in 6 consecutive Tests for a single batsman. This record was shared by Vijay Hazare, Chandu Borde, Sunil Gavaskar, Dilip Vengsarkar and Sadagoppan Ramesh.

10. Two  300 plus partnerships in ODI

 

Rahul holds the records of being in many of the firsts not only in Tests but in ODI as well. He has achieved the feat of  being involved in two ODI partnerships exceeding 300 runs. Dravid was also the first batsman to be involved in a 300 run partnership in a Cricket World Cup along with Sourav Ganguly in the 1999 World Cup match against Sri Lanka at Taunton.

That is not it, there are a trail of records made by Rahul Dravid. Having made his debut in the year 1996, Rahul Dravid served the Indian Team for 16 years after announcing his retirement in 2012.