Dale Steyn is certainly not liking the hype surrounding his chances of becoming South Africa’s highest wicket-taker in Tests. The pacer believes he has much more to offer to his team than completing a mere (!) feat.

Steyn became the second fastest cricketer to reach 400 Test wickets in December 2015, after playing only eighty matches. It took him less than eleven years to achieve the feat, but the injury-prone bowler managed to play only eight matches in the next 31 months, closing in on Shaun Pollock’s 421-wicket milestone on each occasion.

The seamer finally equaled the record during South Africa’s first Test against Sri Lanka in the recently-concluded series but failed to stretch his tally further as he remained wicketless in the second match.

“I actually quite enjoyed Sri Lanka,” Steyn said. “The interesting thing is that lot of people have been saying he's injured, he's struggling and everything like that. But I probably just got through the hardest Test of my career and I'm absolutely fine. That's a plus in my book. I am pretty pleased with that. I walked away from both of those Test matches not leaving the field once or having any problems. So the cloud of injury is, in my opinion, now gone.

“When I started playing cricket I was always told 'Don't play for money, don't play for fame, don't play for records. If you are good enough it will come'. I thought that's perfect, I'll take that. I have played for 14 years. That went quickly. And in that 14 years came all of those things. If I have to sit there and focus on one thing like records, it will consume me.”

The South African is now eyeing 500-plus wickets in the longest version of international cricket. And he just wants to perform well instead of chasing fame and records.

“Actually, it's like a bit of a burden now,” he said. “I hope it just gets out of the way and we can just carry on. Because there's more wickets in me than 421. I have got 500-plus on the horizon so I don't know why we are so consumed on one number.

“When I am bowling it's like ‘You're gonna get there, you're gonna get there’. I know I am, but I'm not interested in getting there. What I am interested in doing is performing well for my country, taking wickets and winning cricket games. If I can do that, those records, that fame and all the other things you want with professional sport will come,” Steyn said.