Veteran India spinner Ravichandran Ashwin is widely regarded as one of the shrewd minds in the game. He is quite outspoken in nature and never shies away from sharing his insights.
Earlier this month, Ashwin was left out of India’s World Test Championship (WTC) final playing XI against Australia at The Oval.
After India suffered a crushing 209-run defeat in the WTC final, Ashwin posted a tweet congratulating the Aussies and thanking his teammates and support staff.
“Congratulations Australia on winning this #WTCFinal and closing out this cycle of test cricket. It is disappointing to end up on the wrong side of things, nevertheless, it was a great effort over the last 2 years or so to get here in the first place. Amidst all the chaos and scathing assessments, I feel it’s very important to acknowledge all my teammates who played in this cycle and most importantly the coaching and support staffs who have held on like a rock of support,” Ashwin tweeted.
In an exclusive chat with The Indian Express, Ashwin opened up about the tweet which came immediately after India’s loss.
“The moment, the final finished I put out a tweet because I realised one thing is that I need closure. The moment I get the closure I can move on. There is no time to hang around. I have understood life a lot better now,” Ashwin said.
The seasoned off-spinner also spoke about the emotional toll the final took on his family.
“The more I see it, the kind of trauma toll it takes on my family is incredible. My father has a heart problem and other issues. Every single game, every single day, something happens, he will call me. He is stressed. It’s very easy for me to go out and play because it is still in my control. For my father, it is not and he goes through double of what I do. So looking at this in hindsight, everybody on the outside is irrelevant,” he added.
Ashwin admitted that he wasn’t happy to see the sympathy messages he received after being overlooked for the WTC final.
“I have got no sympathy for my journey. It’s very easy for me to go back and say, okay, this didn’t happen for me or something happened for him. I don’t give myself one second of sympathy. That’s why I put that tweet because I wanted closure. I hated the fact that people are giving me sympathy, I just couldn’t take it anymore," Ashwin stated.
“In this social media age, you don’t play and sometimes you are bigger than if you had played the game, right? People are talking, ‘if he had played we would have won’. I am not sure if I had played, we would have won. I would have given my best and I definitely think I gave myself the best opportunity to succeed there. I also think I earned my stripes. That’s all I can do. But the moment it got done, I just wanted to move on and focus on the TNPL for Dindigul Dragons,” he further remarked.
