Now, he is only behind the New Zealand great Richard Hadlee, who had 431 wickets for the team. Averaging around 29 in tests, Southee has been the leading bowling figure for the team for more than 10 years.
During the post match talk, Tim Southee reflected his thoughts on becoming the second highest wicket taker for New Zealand, as expected it was an incredibly humble answer from him.
He said, “I think it’s obviously a special moment and one that you’ll look back on and and reflect and I guess be be proud of what you been able to achieve from a kid wanting to just play for New Zealand represent New Zealand to have been very fortunate and playing for for 15 years so far and and loved every minute of it.”
Test five-wicket bag number 15 for Tim Southee. He leads to the team off to applause from the players and crowd at Hagley Oval 🏏 #NZvSL pic.twitter.com/LUfHC8rGv0
— BLACKCAPS (@BLACKCAPS) March 9, 2023
“I guess it’s something you probably look back on later in in life and probably when your career is finished and sit back and and have time to take it in but.”
“At the moment the focus is on the next four days and what we can try and achieve here. So yeah, it’s like I say, all we want to do as a kid was playing New Zealand and been very fortunate and very lucky to have been able to play for for a long period of time.”
On day 2, Tim Southee went on to pick a fifer against Sri Lanka. It was his 15th fifer in test cricket. New Zealand did a good job on day and Sri Lankan batters could only add 49 runs to their first test total on day 2.