by Abhishek Mukherjee

One of my favourite Mark Waugh stories took place on 22 July 2001, at Lord's.

The picture you see here is of him going past Mark Taylor's world record of 157 Test catches by an outfielder.

Waugh came into the Test one short of the record. He caught Butcher off McGrath in the first innings to draw level, then Gough off Gillespie (the 20th England wicket in the Test) to break it.

After the Test, someone in the Australian camp noticed the updates on the Lord's honours board for visitors, where they stick the new entries after writing them out by hand. They stay there until the printed versions are ready.

Mark Waugh (108) had already made it to the batsmen's section and McGrath (5/54) and Gillespie (5/53) to the bowler's section over the course of the Test match — but there was another entry.

In the vacant right bottom corner of the bowler's list, someone had stuck an unusual entry that read MARK WAUGH 158 CATCHES.
(picture courtesy: Steve Waugh)

This was obviously not an authorised act. Fielders never made it to the list. And the board chronicled performances at Lord's, not career records.

Amidst much laughter, a sheepish voice owned up: "Well, no one else would have done it".

Mark Waugh himself.