Joe Root becomes England’s leading Test match run-scorer of all time

Joe Root has become England’s leading Test match run-scorer of all time.

The 33-year-old overtook Sir Alastair Cook’s total of 12,472 on day three of the first Test against Pakistan in Multan.

He passed the milestone as he reached 71 runs in the match and finished the day unbeaten on 176 – the 35th Test century of his career.

With Harry Brook not out on 141 and England on 492-3, the tourists trail by 64 runs going into the fourth day, with seven wickets left.

The former captain barely celebrated his momentous achievement, merely raising his hand to acknowledge the smattering of applause from the sparse crowd during the first session of play.

England, replying to the home side’s 556, were more than 300 runs behind their hosts at the time.

Root eclipsed Cook’s record of 33 Test centuries for England this summer when he scored two hundreds against Sri Lanka at Lord’s.

The Yorkshireman is now the fifth-highest run-scorer in all Test history, behind India’s Sachin Tendulkar, Australian Ricky Ponting, South Africa’s Jacques Kallis and another Indian, Rahul Dravid, who is less than 1,000 ahead of him on 13,288.

All of them have retired from playing.

Root made his Test debut against India in 2012 and made his first century against New Zealand at Headingley the following year.

His highest Test match score is the 254 he struck against Pakistan at Emirates Old Trafford in July 2016, one of five times he has reached 200 in the format.

Sky Sports Cricket commentator Michael Atherton summed up Root’s career as “12 years of excellence”.

The former England captain said Root was an “absolute champion” and one of England’s best, “if not the best player we have had”.

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Sky’s Nasser Hussain said there was “an air of inevitability” about Root completing the achievement on Wednesday.

“Throughout those 12 years he has played with a smile on his face, which is not easy,” he said.

England Cricket said on X that “we are witnessing sheer greatness”.

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On X, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer called it “a fantastic achievement from an outstanding cricketer who just gets better and better”.

Joe Root was not the only member of the Root family celebrating on Wednesday, as he completed his epic feat on the same day his brother Billy, a county cricketer with Glamorgan, got married.