ASHWIN REGAINS NO 1 SPOT

ASHWIN REGAINS NO 1 SPOT

 

Indian off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin on Wednesday reclaimed the number one spot in Test rankings for bowlers following a career-best match haul of 13 for 140 in the third Test against New Zealand in Indore.

Ashwin, who was named man of the series after he finished with 27 wickets in a 3-0 sweep by India, now has 220 wickets, the most by any bowler after 39 Tests.

Ranked third before the final Test in Indore, Ashwin, who also holds the top position in rankings for all-rounders, has leapfrogged pace bowlers James Anderson and Dale Steyn to attain a career-best rating of 900 points.

Ashwin, who finished the 2015 year-end rankings as the number-one bowler and was also at the top briefly in July this year, has joined a select band to have touched a rating of 900 points since 2000, the others being Muttiah Muralitharan, Glenn McGrath, Vernon Philander, Dale Steyn and Shaun Pollock.

In the rankings for Test batsmen, India's middle-order batsman Ajinkya Rahane has attained a career-best sixth rank with scores of 188 and 23 not out.

Rahane, whose previous best was eighth in August this year, has gained five slots after starting the match at 11th position.

Prolific scorer in the New Zealand series, Cheteshwar Pujara and captain Virat Kohli also moved up the rankings.

Pujara's knocks of 41 and 101 not out have helped him move up one place to 14th while Kohli's scores of 211 and 17 at Indore helped him move up four places to 16th position.

For New Zealand, opener Martin Guptill has moved up 10 places to 58th with knocks of 72 and 29 while Jimmy Neesham has moved up 12 slots to 70th position.

In the all-rounders' list, India's Ravindra Jadeja has reached a career-best joint-third rank.

Meanwhile, Pakistan team does not have a chance to reclaim the number-one ranking from India even with a 3-0 win against the West Indies.

Ashwin stands tall

It wasn't for anything that Virat Kohli termed New Zealand's 3-0 rout as a "proper team series win" and a simple piece of statistic will reveal why his observation seems to be so apt in the bigger context.

Off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin's 27 wickets complemented by Ravindra Jadeja's 14 accounted for 41 of the 60 New Zealand scalps.

Compared to India's rich haul, the Kiwi bowlers in all managed 42 scalps — just one more than the Indian 'spin twins'.

Mitchell Santner and Trent Boult just about managed to hit the double figures with 10 wickets apiece.

Ashwin's 27 wicket haul is the second best to Harbhajan Singh (32 wickets vs Australia in 2001) in a three-Test series and with couple of 10-wicket match hauls is only second to Anil Kumble with 6 from 39 Tests.

Ashwin also has the maximum number of Test victims (220) by any bowler after his first 39 Test matches.

The wickets weren't exactly rank turners and Ashwin at times became unplayable on 3rd and 4th day pitches purely due to his skill rather than help off the pitch.

Jadeja as Ashwin termed was an ideal foil as he got the breakthroughs and kept it tight at an economy rate of 2.34.

Among pacers Bhuvneshwar Kumar with a five-wicket haul set it up nicely in Kolkata as Mohammed Shami (8 wickets) got the ball to reverse in the second innings at the Eden Gardens.

In the batting department, Cheteshwar Pujara was in his elements, scoring 373 runs with a hundred and three half-centuries with a handsome average of 74 plus.

It seems that he has made the number three slot his own some more time.

The ever-dependable Ajinkya Rahane continued to grow in stature as a fine long-format player as he recorded his highest individual score of 188 in the Indore Test and was the second highest scorer in the series with 347 runs.

Virat Kohli's double hundred was a delight as the Indian captain joined the party late but ended with 309 runs from the series.

While 211 was a fantastic effort in which he displayed essential virtue like patience, his second innings 45 at Kolkata was a classic cameo considering the pitch became dodgier with passage of time.

Kohli, the captain also came to the fore as he backed Rohit Sharma to the hilt with the Mumbaikar doing well with three second innings half centuries. The 82 at Eden Gardens was an effort which gave India a decisive upperhand.

The other big positive was Wriddhiman Saha slowly but surely filling up the big boots left by Mahendra Singh Dhoni.

The quiet Bengal stumper has been brilliant with his glovework but time and again showed that he has the ability to bat with the tail. The two half-centuries at the Eden Gardens and the man of the match award only bolster his confidence.

In a thoroughly a one-sided series, the only minor blip could be the performance of opener Shikhar Dhawan who failed in the Kolkata Test and should be worried about his place in the side.

Murali Vijay had a couple of half-centuries while Gautam Gambhir, coming back after two and half years, scored a half-century to increase selectorial dilemma.

For New Zealand, opener Tom Latham scored three half-centuries in three matches and the only batsman to aggregate a total of 200 runs — something that Kohli scored in a single innings.

With captain Kane Williamson not managing to negotiate Ashwin well with only 135 runs — one of his disappointing series in recent times, the New Zealand batting looked brittle.

In bowling, the spinners led by Mitchell Santner (10 wickets) tried their best but against a quality batting line-up, they were expected to be found short.

Trent Boult (10 wickets) bowled his heart out but there was little help from the other end as neither Matt Henry (6 wickets) nor Neil Wagner (5 wickets) had the expertise to bowl on Indian pitches.

Boult did miss Tim Southee as his experience would have come in handy.

(the pioneer)