Shakib Al Hasan vs Ravi Ashwin - Better test all rounder?

[Austin 3:!6]

Originally Posted by Rifat
It's not fair to Shakib al Hasan that Bangladesh gets hiatus from Tests for more than 12 months(appalling!!).. also echo what Razab said.

Originally Posted by simon
Ashwin is doing very well, good for him good for India.

I feel sorry for Sakib, we rarely play tests, he could hv achieved a lot more by now.

Rankings are considered over performance of past 2 years. Even India playing test series after 9 months and 1st in this year. Its not as if India is playing frequent test series like Eng or Aust.

[Night_wolf]

just voted for shakib al hasan

ashwin who?

[RazabQ]

Austin, I know you are 80% trolling and 20% throwing out data. But what they hey it's been a relaxing day so I'll humor you.

You mention that India has not had that many Test serieses either. But see, it's not just the getting of the series but also the # of matches in the series. Then, as others have pointed out, the type of wickets Ashwin gets are spin friendly - we have poor pitch preparation history and limited scope of soil and weather condition so we end up making rolled clay, low-and-flat pitches. Finally there's the small matter of the team (aka supporting cast) that you are playing with. In all three, R. Ashwin has HUGE advantages.

Most of the time when Ashwin comes to bowl, he has a lot of runs in the kitty to play with and can really attack. BD batters do not have the overall higher skill level of the Indian batting side - and so we can never give Shak that luxury. Plus the opposition is always worried about what total is safe from the Kohlis and Dhawans so they take risks too. Finally when Ashwin comes to bat, the opposition bowlers are already exhausted.

Still, it is what you do with the pitch and the opportunities the team has given you and ever since Ashwin was dropped from the Test side and then came back, he's been a beast. he's stopped with the dodgy doosra and become arguably the best offie in the game with a lovely loop that evokes Bhajji in his pomp. His batting has always been underrated and if he was getting a chance to bat higher in the order he may have had made more runs. So fair dinkum to Ravichandra and he fully deserves the best all-rounder ranking.

But at least admit this - you wouldn't play him as purely a batsman in this Indian side would you?

[simon]

Originally Posted by Austin 3:!6
Rankings are considered over performance of past 2 years. Even India playing test series after 9 months and 1st in this year. Its not as if India is playing frequent test series like Eng or Aust.

as you brought that up Ashwin played 4 more Test matches than SAkib since 2014, which is quite significant specially if you look at the point gap between them.
It's really a tight contest between the two, I just hope Sakib plays the 4 test matches that we are supposed to play this year.