8th September 2001: Mohammad Ashraful Is The Youngest Test Centurion

The year was 2001 and Bangladesh were not even a year old as far as Test cricket was concerned.They were playing Sri Lanka in their own den and was almost on the verge of being humiliated. And in these trying conditions, a 16-year-old Mohammad Ashraful chose to defy the odds. He not only slammed a century to become the youngest to score a Test century, he also became a national icon overnight.Bangladesh had been bowled out for 90 in their first innings as Muttiah Muralitharan was spitting fire on a slow and low track at Sinhalese Sports Club.

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Cut to the second innings, and nobody expected the Tigers to put up a fight. But they did. Already under pressure after Sri Lanka had posted a mammoth total of 555/5 in their first innings, Bangladesh showed some gumption to fight and Ashraful was in the middle of it.

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He went onto score 114 runs but couldn’t change the result as Bangladesh went onto lose the game by an innings. But on his way, he broke the record which was set by Mushtaq Mohammad, who made a Test century aged 17 years and 82 days.

Ashraful’s career blossomed from that point on as he went onto score five more centuries, one among them came against a quality opposition like India in a losing cause in 2004. Such was the effort that Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar himself lauded Ashraful. Back then, it seemed that Ashraful will have his glory days in future but it wasn’t to be.

Ashraful got entangled in spot fixing and eventually admitted to the offense in Bangladesh Premier League where he was allegedly paid about USD 12,800 to lose the match.

He was also allegedly involved in fixing another match 10 days later, against the Barisal Burners, which his team lost by seven wickets. In June 2014, the Bangladesh Cricket Board found him guilty and banned him for eight years but reduced it to five years with two-year suspension later on.