Jadeja, the indispensable force

At a time when quite a few slots need plugging and questions are being asked if those who hold onto positions are deserving of a quota, it is natural to wonder if anyone in the current Indian Test team is actually indispensable.

Virat Kohli? Perhaps, but only because of reputation, the batting portfolio of a genius and ‘the energy he brings’. One would be foolhardy to use his statistics as a batter to make a case for his repeated inclusion. He last scored a Test century in November 2019, and since then has compiled six half-centuries.

Rohit Sharma? Sure, he’s the Indian skipper and has come up with three hundred and four half-centuries in the same time frame.

KL Rahul? Not really, not even though he is the vice-captain.

R Ashwin? The obvious answer might be a ‘yes’ because few rival his abilities at home, but he’s relegated to benchwarmer when India travel.

For a sample, we could run through India’s playing XI from the opening Test against Australia. Several are very good, but some would lose their spots in the ‘horses for courses’ melee or to others in the squad who have had a better run with bat or ball, irrespective of format.

Not, Ravindra Jadeja, though.

Read | Less is more, the Ashwin way

No matter what the parameters are and what metrics you use to gauge the most indispensable cricketer in the Indian team, the 34-year-old will always find his way into the playing XI of an Indian side. Basically, if Jadeja is available for selection, he’s playing for India.

Obviously, he’s a factor in limited-overs cricket too, and that’s why he was vocally missed during the T20 World Cup in Australia last year. It was reported that sources in Indian management were peeved with the nature of the ‘freak injury’ because they knew he would be unavailable for at least six months.

Since his reconstructive surgery for a torn ACL in the first week of September, he has missed two One-Day International series, seven T20I series including the World Cup and Asia Cup, and a couple of Tests.

India didn’t quite feel the pinch in the Bangladesh Tests because R Ashwin ran riot to win them the series 2-0, but with Australia arriving in India in February, they needed Jadeja.

Axar Patel is good, but Jadeja is better. Kuldeep Yadav would have come in, but it wouldn’t have felt the same.

As if made of something more alien than human, Jadeja returned to cricket for Saurashtra against Tamil Nadu last month and picked up seven wickets for 53 runs from 17.1 overs.

“It took me more time than I anticipated, I wanted to be 100 per cent fit,” he said in his first press conference back. Only Jadeja could have anticipated an earlier return after undergoing a rehabilitation process so severe!

On the back of his first-class performance and comfort levels upon loading his reconstructed knee, India picked him for the all-important series opener at the VCA stadium.

At a time when Ashwin wasn’t particularly threatening and Axar’s under-cutting off-spinners weren’t of any impact, Jadeja became Australia’s nightmare. Using the crease to great effect, left-armer relied on angles and natural variations to end with figures of 5 for 47 from 22 overs.

That display, and the relentless pressure he enforces as a fielder, would be enough to make him tough to ignore, but the 70 runs he put up at No.7… that’s what makes him indispensable.

The comfort with which he took the attack to the Australians after centurion Rohit decided to take a breather was telling. Also, his ability to let Axar lead the way once the Gujarat spinner got into a good grove was brilliant.

In the second innings, when Ashwin went on a wicket-taking spree in the second innings, Jadeja sat back, spent plenty of time attending to his ponytail, and picked up two wickets - one of Marnus Labuschagne - as if an afterthought.

So, he bowls like a dream, his batting is better than it has ever been, he stills fields as if his life depends on it, and he ticks off the ‘cool quotient’ box.

What more will it take to make someone indispensable? Nothing at all.