Ravichandran Ashwin's challenge against South Africa

The series against South Africa will be a big challenge for Ashwin

One of the most highly anticipated contests of the year, the Gandhi-Mandela series is all set to begin in a week’s time starting off with the first T20I at Dharamsala on the 2nd of October. The young Indian team, growing in confidence and consistency with each series, takes on the No.1 team in the world in what is set to be an exciting battle.

If not the only constant, one of the constants in India’s bowling attack from the 2011 World Cup has been Ravichandran Ashwin. He has learnt from his errors and is a much-improved bowler now. While I foresee articles getting published about how the Proteas need to overcome India’s bowling attack in spin friendly conditions, it is going to be an equally tough challenge for Ashwin.

Ashwin is a much-improved bowler now

Over the last 6 months, he has been the best off-spinner in the world with not many plying the trade internationally or those who had made their mark previously waning off, especially Pakistan’s Saeed Ajmal who has struggled since returning with a remodelled action. In his own words, Ashwin aspires to be to the bowling unit what Virat Kohli has been for the batting unit of the team.Though his best performances with the ball can be compared to Virat’s best with the bat he has lacked the consistency that Virat Kohli brings to the table.

Ashwin wants to be the Kohli in the bowling unit

While India came close to winning the first Test against Australia in Adelaide before collapsing in an attempt to chase down the target, Ashwin was bowling in the nets trying to find his rhythm. He seems to have elevated his game since then as we have seen him bowl more off breaks & shifting his line of attack to the off-stump/outside off-stump instead of his preffered middle and leg line.

He has also varied his pace and drift to outfox the batsmen. The key for any sportsman is to have knowledge of his game, to analyze faults in his own game and work to counter it. Going by his recent performances, it seems that he has the right people around him in the team to help him work on it. But the fact remains that this new approach to bowling hasn’t been tested much.

South Africa will be Ashwin’s biggest test yet

Ashwin will be seriously tested by the likes of Amla, De Villiers, and Du Plessis

I believe the series against South Africa is as much a test for Ashwin as it is for their batsmen because he will be up against a better batting unit compared to Sri Lanka, with all due respect. He will face not only the usual suspects in AB de Villiers and Hashim Amla, but also Faf du Plessis, who has already shown his ability to play in Indian pitches and undoubtedly possesses the character and temperament to play a few dogged innings when required.

The pitches used in India for limited overs cricket in recent times has offered close to nothing for the bowler in terms of assistance and the visitors are sure to play him aggressively in the ODI’s and T20I’s. He is bound to get smacked for a few boundaries considering the fact that the tour starts off with T20I’s but what will be interesting to see is how Ashwin reacts to them.

It will also be interesting how he bowls with the change of formats and whether he will bowl in Tests with the same rhythm with which he bowled in Sri Lanka and hopefully win an important series for India again.