ENG vs SL: Joe Root becomes first English batter to reach 8,000 ODI runs

England batting stalwart Joe Root made history on Thursday (Oct 22) by becoming the first English batter to score 8,000 runs in One-Day International (ODI) cricket. The 35-year-old reached the milestone during England’s match against Sri Lanka in the Pakistan ODI Tri-Series, scoring 69 off 66 balls, including eight fours, to cross the 8,000-run mark in his 186th ODI innings.

After his latest knock, Root has 8,005 runs in 197 matches and 186 innings at an average of 50.66 and a strike rate of 87.83. He has scored 20 centuries and 49 half-centuries in the format, with his highest score being 166.

Root also leads England’s all-time ODI run-scoring list by 1,048 runs over former captain Eoin Morgan, who scored 6,957 runs in 225 matches. Jos Buttler follows with 5,678 runs, while Ian Bell (5,416) and Paul Collingwood (5,092) complete the top five. Root also has the best average and the most centuries among these players.

Root made his ODI debut against India in Rajkot in 2013 and has since become one of England’s most reliable batters in the format.

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In 2015 and 2016, he set records for scoring the most runs by an England player across all formats in a calendar year. He scored 2,228 runs in 2015 and improved that tally to 2,570 in 2016.

In 2016, Root also came close to breaking Michael Vaughan’s record for the most Test runs by an England player in a calendar year. He fell just five runs short of Vaughan’s 1,481-run mark, set in 2002.

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Root became England’s Test captain in 2017 after Alastair Cook stepped down. Between 2017 and 2019, he continued to perform consistently in ODIs, scoring more than 900 runs in each of those three years.

He took a break from ODI cricket in 2020 before returning in 2023 for the ODI World Cup. Although England had a disappointing tournament, Root contributed three half-centuries.

With inputs from agencies