#OTD in 2016 | Sir Alastair Cook became the youngest player to score 10,000 Test Runs

On this day, Sir Alastair Cook added another memorable moment to his already illustrious career to become the youngest player (31 years and 157 days) to go past the milestone of 10,000 runs in red-ball cricket. He was also the first England player to achieve this feat as well. 

It all transpired during the 2nd Test of Sri Lanka's tour of England in 2016 at Chester-le-Street. Captain Cook won the toss and chose to bat first. 

Although Cook could contribute only 15 in the first innings, the knocks of 155 from Moeen Ali and 80+ contributions from Alex Hales and Joe Root helped the team to post a mammoth score of 498/9 on the board. 

In reply, Sri Lanka was dismissed for a score of 101 and came back strongly to garner 475 runs after being enforced a follow-on. Wicket-keeper Dinesh Chandimal scored a century for the visitors and helped to set up a modest target of 79 runs. 

After that, Cook brought up his 10k runs in Tests by hitting a boundary in the deep-mid wicket area. He remained unbeaten on 47 off 65 balls to help the team win the Test match and seal the series.

In this pursuit, he broke the record of Sachin Tendulkar, who accomplished this feat when he was 31 years and 326 days old. Overall, Cook became the 12th cricketer to go past this monumental run-tally. 

The first player to score 10,000 runs in the longest format of the game was Sunil Gavaskar. 

Starting his career in the whites with 60 and 104* against India at Nagpur in 2006, Cook amassed a total of 12472 runs in 161 matches, with 33 centuries in Test cricket. 

He holds the record for playing the most consecutive Test matches (159), until he featured in his last fixture against India in September 2018. 

In 2019, Cook was the first player after Sir Ian Botham to receive Knighthood for his services to cricket. After that, he is known as 'Sir Alastair Cook'. 

It's been more than six years, and none of the batters has come close to Cook. Soon, Joe Root is expected to be the second English batter to join the 10k-club as well. 

This fixture also marked the 300 wickets for Rangana Herath and 450 scalps for James Anderson in the red-ball cricket.