Captain MS Dhoni and his five undroppables

5. Ravichandran Ashwin

CSK Player # 3

Oops, I took a wicket!

(i) 53-0-290-1 – Ravichandran Ashwin’s cumulative return in his last 6 ODI games for India.(ii) 290 – Also, the same amount of runs (almost) Dale Steyn conceded in his last 10 ODIs while picking up 26 wickets.

How an international player can still retain his place after astronomical figures like that is hard to fathom (obvious reference to point (i)). What is even more harder to understand is the player himself coming out and saying that he was in the ‘best frame of mind’ while committing these blatant butcheries. To say that his bowling is world-class is a chronic understatement. His carrom-ball is so badly disguised and easy to pick out that he shudderingly reminds me of Piyush Chawla sending down his faster ones.

To further drown him in statistics, amongst all the bowlers who bowled in more than 5 innings away from home in the last 1 year of ODI cricket, Ashwin has the second-worst bowling average after Xavier Doherty.

The worst part? Even Suresh Raina and Virat Kohli have a better bowling average than him. Even though he can be charged with mental debauchery by many Indian fans, he still has kept the balance intact in international cricket. His obvious fall in his bowling average has been counterweighted by the increase in his batting average. Is he our next Irfan Pathan? He is at least on his road to enlightenment.

Special Mention:

N. Srinivasan

CSK # Player of all players

One man to rule them all

Indian Law of Cricket: Any Dhoni team without Srinivasan cannot be a Dhoni team and vice-versa.

The mastermind of them all, the megalomaniac Srinivasan is the one who calls all the shots. The fact that there have been as many as 14 players from Chennai Super Kings, all seasons and all squads combined, who have represented India shows a problem somewhere in the system at least in one way or the other (not that people didn’t know that there was a fault in the system in the first place).

Undoubtedly though, amongst all the players mentioned on the list so far, Srinivasan has by far been the most consistent. Even when he was under severe pressure, he went out positively and straight-batted all the doubts and questions to each and every corner of the ground and eventually emerged as the lone winner.

In the post-match conference, he also heckled his opponents by saying, ‘If you couldn’t get me out back then, you can never get me out’, a statement accompanied with a slight smirk. Classic Srinivasan moment, that. ­With a player like him in their ranks, there is no surprise that BCCI comes out as the winner each and every time, Big 3 or no Big 3.

DISCLAIMER: The views expressed are the author’s own. They do not reflect those of the website as a whole.