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- By Suresh Menon
- sports writer
Image source, fake images
Ashwin made his debut in 2011 and played over 90 Tests.
Of the nine players who have taken 500 Test wickets, India’s Ravichandran Ashwin, who has now joined the club, is by far the best batsman with five centuries.
Had Ashwin, 37, chosen to concentrate on batting excluding bowling, he may have ended up with over 10,000 Test runs.
On Friday, he became the ninth man to reach 500 meters. On the same day, the player withdrew from the third Test against England due to a family emergency, but is now back with the team.
There is a silky touch to Ashwin’s batting and stubbornness that saw him bravely save a Test alongside Hanuma Vihari. Both batsmen suffered body blows and injuries in the match.
There’s a similar blend of the artsy and the abrasive, the classic and the contemporary, in his bowling too. The variations on the rest theme that he developed early meant that early in his career he tended to try too many things. (An off-break delivery spins from the off side to the leg side when bowled to a right-handed batsman. It is the most popular method of spin in cricket.)
It ranged from his run to how he held the ball in his hand and the angle of the seam. He went against the traditional wisdom that he held that you should have a standard ball and use variations sparingly. But he served Ashwin well, and he took nine five-wicket hauls in his first 16 Tests.
In many ways, Ashwin is one of a kind, even if he has to share the tag of being the best contemporary spinner with Australian Nathan Lyon. He is often not considered the greatest of all time because 70% of his career has come home in familiar condition.
Ashwin is the second Indian bowler, after Anil Kumble, to join the 500-wicket club.
India has a rich bowling tradition from Ghulam Ahmed, Erapalli Prasanna, Srinivas Venkataraghavan to Harbhajan Singh and Ashwin. Each one is original, which might have had something to do with their success. That three of them, including Ashwin, are qualified engineers could be a coincidence, but non-spinners have to work harder at their craft, and that combination of discipline and brainpower comes in handy.
Give anyone a ball and ask them to spin it. Most likely they will take a break. Provides familiarity for right-handers, whose natural swing is towards the leg. This, combined with powerful modern bats, ensures that the spinner has a tough job. With the growth of white-ball cricket, it was assumed that the tribe would disappear. So those who have succeeded for many years (Ashwin debuted in 2011) and in different conditions are special.
“Obsessive” is the word often used to describe him because he is constantly thinking about his game. He speaks with authority and intelligence, and he also developed the carrot ball, moving it with the middle finger so that it goes to the other side. She talks about strong fingers, a strong mind and confidence in his craft.
With ball in hand, he is a poker player who plays as if he can see the other’s hand. In recent years he has been in and out of the Indian team, but he has always given the impression that he is still one step ahead of everyone else. In the modern game nothing is secret for long. He develops a new delivery and by the end of the day the computer has analyzed it thoroughly and a schoolboy in Iceland is testing it. Bowlers must work hard to stay ahead of the MacBook.
Image source, fake images
Around 70% of Ashwin’s wickets have been taken at home; here he celebrates England’s Ben Duckett’s wicket in Hyderabad.
Once younger men began leading India, Ashwin knew his chances of becoming captain were gone: he would have been an excellent captain. The other 10 players might have found it a little difficult to understand him at first, since his mind moves on a different plane; He has said, for example, that A bad ball can be the most dangerous ball in T20 cricket. – but once he gained their trust, they would eat out of his hands.
With Ravindra Jadeja, Ashwin formed India’s most effective bowling partnership, with over 500 wickets bowling as a pair. Jadeja is a nice contrast: steady, quick, agile, the serious man to Ashwin’s varied expressions. In some ways, the couple they displaced, Anil Kumble-Harbhajan Singh, had similar temperaments.
Among Indians, Ashwin’s tally is second only to Kumble’s. He told an interviewer a few years ago: “I am a big fan of Kumble. He has 619 wickets. If I get to 618 I will be very grateful and that will be my last Test match.”
It’s a glimpse into the mind of a fascinating man.