Why is Nathan Lyon called the GOAT: Nathan Lyon is the first off-spinner outside Asia to achieve the milestone of 400 test wickets.
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Australia have sealed the Ashes 2021-22 urn already, and the bowlers have played a huge part in it. The pacers have enjoyed bowling, but there is a spinner who knows how to take wickets in Australia. In a series where the pacers are dominating, Lyon has been the highest wicket-taker of the series so far [till 1st innings of 5th test].
After Shane Warne, Lyon has been the most prolific Australian spinner. In the 1st Ashes test at Brisbane, Lyon completed the milestone of 400 test wickets. Lyon became just the third Australian after Shane Warne and Glenn McGrath to achieve this milestone. He is the 17th overall bowler in the test cricket to do so.
Lyon is also the first-ever off-spinner outside Asia to take 400 test wickets. Before him, only Muttiah Muralitharan, Harbhajan Singh, and R Ashwin have achieved that milestone.
The moment Nathan Lyon finally got Test wicket number 400 🙌 #Ashes pic.twitter.com/gQSCUwAVnP
— ESPNcricinfo (@ESPNcricinfo) December 11, 2021
Why is Nathan Lyon called the GOAT
Nathan Lyon’s teammates calls him “GOAT” [Greatest of All Time]. Although, it’s true that Lyon has been the greatest off-spinner from Australia, but that name came in 2015. After the 2015 Australia tour to West Indies, the teammates started calling Lyon as GOAT. Lyon was an apprentice groundsman, but now he is the most capped Test player of the current setup.
On the 2015 Caribbean tour, Nathan Lyon scalped eight wickets in two games at 19.25. The pitches were seam-friendly and Nathan Lyon bowled beautifully on those tracks. However, Lyon recalls that 2012 incident which gave him an alarm bell.
“It was about my 10th or 11th Test match and we were in Trinidad and Tobago on a West Indies tour,” Lyon recalls.
“Justin Langer was the [Australian team] batting coach at that time and he called me into his room in the hotel just to have a yak.”
“He goes: ‘I just wanted to get you in here to let you know that the honeymoon period is over. Now you are a Test cricketer, you have to start performing and getting results for us’.”
Nathan Lyon has nine Test sixes – he’s hit a third of them against England in Hobart.
In fact, he’s now hit more sixes in Tests at Blundstone Arena than Ricky Ponting and Matthew Hayden.
The GOAT doing GOAT things.#Ashes pic.twitter.com/r58DnoRO06
— bet365 AUS (@bet365_aus) January 15, 2022
Nathan Lyon was then dropped from the Australian team in Ashes 2013 series. Now, Nathan Lyon is untouchable in the squad, and he insists that the Langer’s confrontation in 2012 made him a better player.
“That was probably the biggest for me, that ‘this is real’,” Lyon says. “That the honeymoon was officially over.”
After 2015, Lyon got the nickname “GOAT” and he has done everything to prove that name right.
