Sanjay Manjrekar, the former India batsman, has found himself yet in another controversy after saying that India’s ace off-spinner R Ashwin is not quite an all-time great in his books. His remarks made quite a furor with a number of cricketers expressing their contrary views on the issue.
Sanjay Manjrekar, while talking on ESPNCricinfo.com, had said that he doesn’t agree with people calling R Ashwin an all-time great. He said that since Ashwin doesn’t have any five-wicket haul in the SENA (South Africa, England, New Zealand, and Australia) countries, he cannot be termed as an all-time great.
Ashwin boasts quite an excellent record though. He has 409 wickets in 78 Tests, 150 wickets in 111 ODIs, and 52 wickets in 46 T20I matches. He was part of India’s 2011 World Cup and 2013 Champions Trophy win.
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“When people start talking about him as being one of the all-time greats of the game then I have a few problems. One basic problem I have with Ashwin is that when you look at SENA countries, Ashwin doesn’t have a single five-wicket haul there,” Manjrekar said on ESPNCricinfo.
However, his statement didn’t sit right with former Australia captain Ian Chappell, who himself is a legend of world cricket.
“I would like to make a couple of points there — if you look at Joel Garner, I mean how many five-wicket hauls Joel Garner has? Not many, when you consider how good he was and his record. And why, because he was performing with three other very, very fine players. And I think, particularly of late, I find that the Indian attack has been so strong that the wickets are being shared around more,” Chappell pointed out.
After being bombarded for his statement of R Ashwin, Manjrekar took to Twitter to defend himself and justified what he said, by citing examples of Sunil Gavaskar and Sachin Tendulkar who he called all-time greats.
“’All- time great’ is the highest praise & acknowledgement given to a cricketer. Cricketers like Don Bradman, Sobers, Gavaskar, Tendulkar, Virat etc are all time greats in my book. With due respect, Ashwin not quite there as an all-time great yet,” he said.
