Mere numbers in excess of 708 speak very little of who Muttiah Muralitharan is. Forget the fact, that he’s a magician capable of turn on a glossy, glass wicket in the monsoons. Forget the fact that he’s obviously the best spinner to play the game. And, for a moment, forget the fact that Sri Lanka, in atleast a few generations before and after him, will never be able to find a bowler of his capability, determination and hunger for wickets.

As class batsmen would testify, the ‘optical illusion of throwing’ is quite irrelevant. Deformity or not, the man is a bowing genius, and 708 is just a mathematical milestone, a simple numerical testimonial of what he really means.

Having every delivery in his bag of tricks - the doosra, the straighter-one, the hugely spinning offie, the quicker one, the loop - for the batsman, it becomes almost impossible to read him. Reducing the pitch and a batsman’s reputation to non-entities, he hops in a very uncomplicated manner to pick wicket after wicket. Honestly, if there ever existed weapons of vast destruction, one needn’t look further than Murali.

His greatness doesn’t lie in the magic he weaves or the havoc he wreaks, but in his humility and modesty. When he isn’t maiming batting cards on a routine day at the office, Muralitharan divides his time between innovating a new murderous delivery, fighting poverty, and clearing controversies associated with his action, three activities which would remain with him till the end. It’s uncannily ironic that the one bowler who has been targeted the most by experts and critics around the world has risen to prove them wrong. Today, enough ink has been spent towards his glorification, and continues to be spent, as he goes past hurdle after hurdle, to a pinnacle that only he can ascend.

While the cricketing world celebrates his achievement, and while batsmen around the world continue to struggle against him, one must come to terms with a simple reality: with the likes of Inzamam and Lara out of world cricket, and barring the big-Indian-troika of batsmanship, few batsman around the world exist who are capable of dominating Muttiah Muralitharan.

Simply because, quenching his thirst for wickets is a straightforward impossibility.