Why this is India's best collective bowling performance in a long time

Indian players celebrating after the fall of a wicket

Finally, the wait is over. India won a Test series after 2 years but more significantly, it’s the first time in history that India managed to come back from a 1-0 deficit in an away series and win it. Virat Kohli and his men, donning their white jerseys, lifted India’s first overseas trophy for 4 years. To further emphasize the importance of the result, this is India’s first series win in Sri Lanka since 1993.

Sachin Tendulkar couldn’t do it. Saurav Ganguly couldn’t do it. Even the most successful test skipper of India, M.S. Dhoni failed to conquer the Lankans at their backyard. But Virat Kohli made it. Nothing new for someone who has always made the impossible possible. Hats off to his captaincy.

Apart from Kohli’s first Test series win as a captain after a couple of heartbreaking failures, there’s much more to be celebrated in this historic win, including Cheteshwar Pujara’s stunning comeback, but what’s the most important highlight of this triumph?

A bowlers’ series

Obviously it was a bowlers’ series. There wasn’t a single innings where a team scored above 400 in the entire series. Ironically, it comes as a huge relief for the Indian skipper. Not often have we seen the Indian bowlers taking all 20 wickets in a match in the recent past. And for the fact that they bowled out their opposition in all the 6 innings, it’s something to be cheered.

Ravichandran Ashwin scalped 21 wickets while Amit Mishra backed him well by picking up 15 wickets. In fact, Ashwin’s mind-boggling average of 18.09 is the best for an Indian spinner who had more than 20 more wickets in an away series. After the first two Tests which were played on turning tracks, the Indian pacers, especially Ishant Sharma got a chance to have a go at the hapless Lankan batsmen at the SSC, Colombo.

India has found the answer to Kumble-Harbhajan duo’s successors

India’s spin duo of Ashwin & Mishra picked up 36 wickets between them

Ashwin won the Man of the Series accolade for his outstanding bowling throughout the series. He bowled with discipline, sticking to the basics of off spin bowling and occasionally trying his newly developed incoming delivery with the new ball to the left-handers. He deceived the batsman with his flight, his seam presentation was spot on and assisted by the spinning turf, he looked unplayable at times.

Mishra may not have many variations, but his googly proved to be too much for many Lankan batsmen, especially the tail-enders. And that’s something to be fêted. It’s been a while since India had been struggling to wipe out the opposition’s lower order batsmen (Indian fans will never forget Anderson-Root partnership and the way New Zealand resurged with Brendon McCullum’s triple century after being reduced to 94-5), and Mishra’s inclusion seemed to have solved the issue of ‘tail wagging’.

Indian spinners scalped 7 wickets in the 3rd Test, which is definitely a notable achievement on a pitch that favoured fast bowling. A leg-spin – off-break combination is always a deadly combo against any opposition. After the hugely successful Anil Kumble – Harbhajan Singh duo, India has now found two talented spinners who are capable of bringing the spin attack to its old might.

Ishant Sharma is now the Indian pace spearhead

Though the spinners took the lead by claiming 36 wickets, Indian pacers played a pivotal role throughout the series. Ishant Sharma was a silent assassin in the first two Tests, bowling in tight lines and maintaining the pressure, which helped the spinners to breach the defenses of the hosts. Once he got a lively green turf in the final Test, he showed his inner demons to the Lankans by bagging 8 wickets for 86 runs.

His seam presentation has got better now and he bowled in the near 140’s while also making good use of his height to trouble the batsmen with some high bouncers. Though it took some ugly verbal spat to fire him up, India can be quite proud of an aggressive fast bowler after Sreeshant. He has now taken the responsibility of being the spearhead of Indian pace attack.

In the absence of Bhuvaneshwar Kumar, Ishant also bowled well with the new ball; something which he wasn’t accustomed to doing in the recent past. Dhoni had the habit of making the second new ball wait even after 80 overs just because of a lack of the wicket taking abilities of the Indian pacers. But when Ishant took the new ball in the 81st over of the final innings of the third Test, Kohli made his point that he has faith in his faster bowlers.

And the lanky pacer didn’t disappoint his captain, removing the Sri Lankan skipper Angelo Mathews in the very first over itself with an in-swinger. It turned out to be a key moment in the match which was turning in favour of the hosts after a resilient partnership by Mathews and Kushal Perera.

The supporting cast

Stuart Binny chipped in with useful contributions with the ball

We must also not forget the tremendous support Ishant got from the tearaway quick Umesh Yadav. Though he doesn’t have many wickets in his bag to boast of, he was the one who gave the much needed initial breakthroughs for the visitors. Being precise in his line and length, he hit the deck hard to generate a considerable amount of pace and bounce and also bowled some fabulous spells, mounting the pressure from one end.

Stuart Binny wasn’t bad with his all-rounder skills. His addition brought the much-needed stability to the Indian line-up though he still has to work on his batting to be one of the best all-rounders of India. Amit Mishra and Ravichandran Ashwin also displayed their batting abilities, scoring some crucial runs in the 2nd innings of the final Test. Therefore, India can now rely on their tail-enders for some quality support, towards the back end of the innings.

Overall, it has been an admirable and collective performance of the Indian bowlers. Pacers stayed fit throughout the series and spinners played their part. With this experience, once they go for yet another series outside Asia, we can hope that they will change the tragic history of India’s overseas tours and will bring glory to the young and reckless Kohli.