All -tme India Test XI

India’s best captains miss out

Some of India’s prominent and earliest heroes, who put the country on the world cricket map, like Vijay Hazare, Vinoo Mankad, Amar Singh, Mohammad Nissar and Nari Contractor could not manage to find a spot in SportsKeeda’s All Time India XI (Tests).

The other notable omissions from this line up are two of India’s successful test captains in the form of Sourav Ganguly and Mohammad Azharuddin. Both, exceptionally wonderful test batsmen could not find a way through into the team that boasted of stars who have commanded respect worldwide with their performances on the field and their demeanor off the field.

Most of the selected were either from the team of 70s, usually called as the renaissance period in Indian cricket when India started to fight it out against stronger oppositions like West Indies, England and Australia, and the team of 2000s, who the historians call as the golden generation of Indian cricket.

Openers – Sunil Gavaskar and Virender Sehwag

This was one of the easiest choices that we had to make. Out of a very few elite test openers we’ve had, Sunil Gavaskar and Virender Sehwag were voted as the best pair to open for India in test matches. Sehwag’s firepower brand of cricket perfectly matches Gavaskar’s patient and traditional brand of cricket.

It’s a deadly Mumbai-Delhi combination which can actually amass huge amount of runs together. Both love to stitch long innings time and again and if at all we have a competition to showcase world-class openers, here we have one pair which can actually even win a competition of that sort.

While Gavaskar garnered 48% votes from the readers, Sehwag managed 40% of them. A worthy mention in this list is Gautam Gambhir, who received 6% share of votes and ended up as India’s 3^rd best opener till date.

Middle Order – Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and Gundappa Viswanath

This was another segment of the poll which had the Mumbai-Bangalore connection going extremely strong. The results have shown many things including the powerhouses of Indian cricket through the years. Until the 2000s, most of India’s distinguished cricketers were from the top tier cities in India like, Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore. Cricket seldom seeped through these cities into little towns and villages to bring out world-champions.

India’s best cricketing sons have made a place for themselves in the middle order. This, they’ve done, even before they have even retired from international cricket. Sachin Tendulkar, darling of the masses, collected 47% votes, while 43% readers voted for the Wall. Dravid’s story is quite an inspiring one. Starting a test career as a batsman when Tendulkar was at his peak could easily be the toughest thing to do. It is because critics compare your batting with the master and on most occasions, Sachin Tendulkar overshadows others. That he has managed to carve out a niche for himself, when Tendulkar was still ruling the world of batsmen, speaks volumes of the dedication, concentration and hardwork Dravid has put to earn every single test run he has scored till date.

The line up is completed with another Bangalorean in Gundappa Viswanath. If it was the Dravid-Tendulkar pair that captured the minds and hearts of many in world-cricket during the 2000s, the Viswanath-Gavaskar combination did create the same magic about 30 years ago.

Gundappa Viswanath is one of those cricketers who is never spoken highly of. But, silently, he finds a place in India’s best XI. That’s how much he impacted in Indian cricket with his batsmanship so many years ago when India started to fight back and the world started to notice that India has some kind of spunk in them.

Some of other great middle-order batsmen who missed the bus were, Vijay Hazare, Mohammed Azharuddin, Sourav Ganguly and VVS Laxman. That, Mohammed Azharuddin manage to pip Hazare and Laxman is a bit of surprise, considering the fact that Azhar’s image was tarnished very badly when the match-fixing saga came out in public. This poll suggests that he is still recognized for his batting skills by many.

All Rounder – Kapil Dev

There can be little doubt in who India’s best all rounder is. Wisden had acknowledged his services to Indian cricket by calling him India’s best cricketer of the 20^th century.

Kapil Dev has done everything in Indian cricket to earn such respect. He played a brand of cricket that very few in the world perfected. Even before the Sehwags and the Gilchrists came into the scene, Kapil demonstrated how power-hitting can demoralise oppositions. His swing bowling even took him to the top spot (Most number of test wickets) in world cricket at one point of time.

Wicket Keeper – MS Dhoni

As it has been throughout this poll, this segment was again contested by two men who were from the renaissance period of 70s and from the golden generation of the 2000s.

MS Dhoni, India’s current test captain, though managed to win this place quite handsomely. 54% of the readers thought Dhoni is already India’s best ever wicket keeper. Kirmani managed to woo 23% of the voters. The whole definition of the new age wicket keeper has changed. The emphasis is more on their batting skills than their wicket-keeping skills. Having said that, Dhoni has managed to do a commendable job behind the stumps. He has seldom dropped catches and missed stumpings in these years. That no one talks about Dhoni’s wicket keeping is the best thing about him. It means, he is not messing up the things behind the stumps.

Spinners – Anil Kumble, Bishan Bedi

Anil Kumble’s tenacity and his tireless efforts to take wickets and lead India to success both home and away has earned him a place in India’s best XI.

The spinner who will pair up with Jumbo, is India’s legendary left-arm spinner, Bishan Singh Bedi. Kumble took the poll by a storm by capturing 47% of the votes. Bedi finished a distant second with 18% votes. On his way to the top, Kumble managed to stay ahead of many of his own mentors in the form of Bhagwat Chandrasekhar, Srinivas Venkatraghavan and Erapalli Prasanna. It’s a great reward for a spinner who has mesmerised batsmen for close to 20 years not with orthodox spin, but more by accuracy and precision.

Fast Bowlers – Javagal Srinath, Zaheer Khan

It’s a dream bowling combination when we look into the two spinners who have managed to get the maximum votes and India’s best all rounder, Kapil Dev. Javagal Srinath and Zaheer Khan will form a potent combination any day. They have already shown it in the past between 2000 and 2002.

Since the day Zaheer made his debut until Srinath called it a day, the pair played 14 tests together for India. They also managed to pick up 77 wickets in those tests. Considering the fact that Indians usually rely on their spinners to pick wickets, this pair has done extremely well in both India as well as abroad to pick up as many wickets as they have done here.

ALL TIME INDIA XI – Sunil Gavaskar, Virender Sehwag, Rahul Dravid, Sachin Tendulkar, Gundappa Viswanath, MS Dhoni, Kapil Dev, Anil Kumble, Zaheer Khan, Javagal Srinath and Bishan Singh Bedi. 12^th man – Mohammed Azharuddin.

POST-SCRIPT – Special thanks to everyone who made this poll happen. You can find all the parts of this all-time India XI series here.