Rahul Dravid: The underrated legend in ODIs

His variable batting positions made him more versatile

Dravid was the leading run-getter in the 1999 World Cup

What makes Dravid so special as an ODI player is his versatility. Scoring those many runs is a herculean task as it is, but the circumstances under which he scored them makes it stupendous. Till now we have only talked about the numbers game and not the way they came. Dravid by nature was a top order batsman, who’d rather prefer playing a long steady innings than having a short-burst lower down the order.

But that’s what we saw him doing so often. 86 times in 318 innings Dravid batted at number 5 or lower, Tendulkar just 41 in 452 and Ganguly did that just 12 times in 300 innings. At number 4, Dravid batted 102 times, Tendulkar 61 and Ganguly 20 times.

Playing at 5 or 6, Tendulkar scored 945 runs at an average of 30.48 while Ganguly averaged 24.84, 26.29 and 7.50 at 4, 5 and 6, But Dravid amassed 3,301 and 2,459 runs at an average of 36.27 and 43.91 at 4 and 5 respectively.

At no.4, Tendulkar and Dravid are neck and neck, with Tendulkar averaging 2 runs more per innings while Dravid scoring thousand runs more than Tendulkar did at that position.

He was the leading run-scorer in the '99 WC, amassing 461 runs in 8 innings at a strike rate of 85.52, and still it was Lance Klusener and not him who won the player of the series award that tournament. He rarely got the opportunity to play freely at the top, and even when he was the captain, he preferred dealing with the tougher task.

His career in the IPL further proves his versatility as a batsman, he was almost as successful as Tendulkar and overshadowed Ganguly by a country mile. Dravid’s overall stats may not look as good as Ganguly’s or Tendulkar’s, but, taking no credit away from them, Dravid was more versatile than the other two legends.