There is no stopping the Team India juggernaut in Test cricket. With Monday’s huge win over Bangladesh in a one-off Test in Hyderabad, Virat Kohli’s men extended their unbeaten run to 19 Tests. They have now rolled over New Zealand, England and their South Asian neighbours in the grand home season, and now set their sights on the next marquee four-Test series against their fierce rivals Australia, who are desperate to shed their recently acquired tag of being the sub-continental spin bunnies.
Australia coach Darren Lehman has admitted that his backroom staff have not formulated any specific strategy to stop Kohli. The Indian captain is in the form of his life and grabbed the Man of the match trophy for his record-breaking 204 which set up the 208-run win over Bangladesh. After securing their fifth Test win on the trot on Monday, Kohli said “everyone’s minds and hearts are already on it (the Australia series).”
While the Aussies are not publicly singling out Kohli for special treatment, they are secretly dreading the prospect of facing the trickery of Ravichandran Ashwin. Like his captain who is on a milestone-hogging spree, Ashwin too is making rapid strides towards becoming a modern day bowling great. Playing his 45th Test in Hyderabad, he became the fastest bowler to reach 250 Test wickets. The wily off-spinner from Tamil Nadu has firmly established himself as the world’s top spinner since making his debut in 2011 and reached the impressive landmark -- beating Dennis Lillee’s record of 48 for Australia. He wrestled the Indian record from his current coach Anil Kumble quite easily as well, by eight matches.
Although he has cruised past cricketing milestones in a predestined fashion, Ashwin will be relishing the opportunity to square up against Aussies, the opposition that provided him the springboard to super stardom. For a much touted up and coming spinner, he had relatively poor returns during the tour of Australia in 2011-12. His inadequacies were then exposed during the 2012-13 home series versus England, where he was outbowled by Graeme Swann and Monty Panesar as India conceded the series 2-1. Then failure hit hard as he was dropped from the side after he could not bowl South Africa out on a final day Johannesburg pitch in 2013 and did not return for six Tests. The penny finally dropped when he was left out again in Adelaide against the Australians in 2014. It fired him up. He worked on his chinks and with minor adjustments, focussed on spinning his off-break. When the Aussies came calling in 2012-13, he was ready.
From then to now, he has strode on to become the No. 1 Test bowler. The Australia series is another chance to add up
those numbers.
