Moeen Ali has become the fastest English spinner to cross the 20 wicket-mark in Test cricket, featuring in only six matches that spanned across 58 days and the 'part-time' off-spinner has termed his recent performance as "crazy".
For a team that was struggling three matches ago to replace Graeme Swann, England have now completely moved on from the retired off-spinner.
"It is crazy. I never thought of it. It is still early days in my career," Ali told BBC, when he was informed of the record. "It is a great feeling winning the game for your country twice in a row. I have tried to stay as level as I can and not get too carried away. I practice hard and I feel it comes out on the field."
Swann had enjoyed a lot of success against Indian batsmen, having taken 13 wickets in four Tests during the 2011 tour and then another 20 when England toured in 2012-13. Comparatively, in four matches against India so far, Ali has already picked up 19 wickets.
He may not have completely exceeded Swann as yet, but he has exceeded expectations.
It has a meteoric rise for Ali, who has grown from being the support-bowler to Saeed Ajmal of Pakistan at Worcestershire to his country's lead-spinner.
In the first Test at Nottingham, it almost appeared as if England didn't have a second line of attack after James Anderson and Stuart Broad. The flat pitch there masked this belief. And they didn't fare well enough on the green-top at Lord's either, so nobody noticed that Ali had quietly picked up seven wickets in the first two Tests.
India failed to notice many problems in their touring set-up thanks to that euphoric 95-run win and tackling Ali was one of them.
But at Southampton they were duly found out. The Indian batsmen didn't know whether to come forward or go back to Ali. They didn't want to attack him because they were fighting to save the match. And when they defended, they collapsed.
