WI vs IND | Antigua Day 2 Talking Points - Ishant Sharma’s grittiness and Windies’ failure to fill Shane Dowrich-shaped void

08/24/2019

Ishant Sharma played one of the best support acts of recent times to help Ravindra Jadeja take India to a comfortable position in the first Test against the Windies in Antigua. While India are somehow sorted in the Test, Windies are left pondering the ways to fill Shane Dowrich-shaped void.

Ishant Sharma and the grittiness with the bat

Virender Sehwag’s promotion to the top of the order had turned out to be a masterstroke for the Indian cricket team in the early 2000s and that only decision changed the way team approached Test cricket. The batting order was populated with the indisputable masters of the art of batting in Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, Virender Sehwag, Sourav Ganguly, and VVS Laxman. Almost in a balancing scenario, India’s tail was almost non-existent, but the perception changed during the first Test against Australia in 2010-11.

With a final act of resistance, Laxman changed the very dynamics and led the team from 76 for 5 to 216 for victory in Mohali. While Pragyan Ojha’s 10-ball stay often took the cake, Ishant Sharma’s gritty 31 off 92 balls to help India salvage the pride is never talked about in the same vein. Perhaps it is the time, we start to acknowledge his prowess with the bat a bit more than what the naked numbers suggest. Ishant might not be a flamboyant tail-ender, but his prodding and resistance are better than 80% of the tail-enders in the world.

Today, after Rishabh Pant was dismissed, Ravindra Jadeja needed a partner who could give him the equal amount of support, and then rose Ishant to the occasion. With stoic defence, the Delhi pacer ensured a fine partnership and that eventually ended after taking India to a position of safety. Never pleasing to the eye, nor did he have the ability of scoring runs like few of his contemporaries, but he has heart and the zeal to grind it out. That itself is a trait invaluable for the Indian cricket team in situations like today and the team management would never want to trade that with anything else.

Dowrich’s absence muddles Windies batting order

During India’s last Test tour to the Caribbean Islands, India won the four-match Test series 2-0 and had rain not washed away an entire day's play in Jamaica and then the Trinidad game wouldn’t have been affected, the Virat Kohli-led touring party might very well have won that 4-0. While the results were pretty one-sided, Roston Chase, Shane Dowrich, and Jason Holder joined hands to deny India a win at Sabina Park, and with that Windies discovered an able middle-order that was bankable enough.

However, in what has come as really perplexing news, Windies decided to do away with Dowrich after few bad performances against India A in the series preceding the ongoing series, overlooking the fact that he had an unbeaten century against England earlier this year. But more importantly, Dowrich provided stability to the team’s plans. Project this to have a clear understanding.

As the Windies handed Shamarh Brooks a debut cap, that messed up with their plans as Shai Hope had to keep wickets as well. It was fine but then again, expecting him to bat at his usual No.4 position would have been foolish, because of the number of squats he had to do behind the stumps. As a result, the team sent in Brooks, Darren Bravo, and Roston Chase ahead of him, while keeping Hope and Shimron Hetmyer for No.6 and No.7.

This might project things in a different way as a capable batsman in the form of Jason Holder is batting at No.8 but that comes as an illusion. With the top order that is made up of straw and tissue paper, there was hardly any recovery work to do lower down the order. Had Windies drafted in a proper wicket-keeper batsman to bat at somewhere around No.6 or below, it would have allowed Hope to bat with freedom and composure.

Jadeja solved the Ashwin puzzle, once and for all

If we go by the recent form, Ravindra Jadeja would any day come ahead of Ravichandran Ashwin for the pure all-rounder that he has become in the last two years. However, the form of 2016 and the reputation as India’s all-time best off-spinner in Test cricket had many fans and experts rooting for the Tamil Nadu all-rounder, and Sunil Gavaskar went as far as calling the decision to leave out Ashwin “baffling”.

Being thrown into the deep end, Jadeja, however, answered it in his own style. His fifty, one of the most important arbiters for India in the context of the game, came while batting with the tailenders. He, of course, had the ability - his average of 44 in the last 10 Tests justifies the claim - but the way he paced his innings was the most mature act. Never did he hurry himself to score big hits, rather waited for the opportunity while dealing with dot balls in the middle.

With the ball too, he was spot on. With the wicket not having enough for the spinners to bank on, Jadeja, as usual, focused more on landing the ball in the right areas and accounted for Shamrah Brooks almost instantly. Although the pacers dictated the course of the game, Jadeja played the holding role to perfection and in the truest sense, created more opportunities than even Mohammed Shami.