Ashwin, Ojha create an unprecedented feat of three consecutive twin bowling hundreds at home

Amidst the abject surrender to England, Ravichandran Ashwin and Pragyan Ojha have achieved the unique feat of three consecutive twin bowling centuries. Arunabha Sengupta looks at records to find that this is a first by Indian spinners bowling at home.

---
 
In the midst of the despair of defeats, Ravichandran Ashwin and Pragyan Ojha have collaborated to etch their names in indelible, if somewhat dubious, characters in the glorious annals of Indian spin tradition. They have also set themselves up for an unbeatable record – provided they can carry on bowling in the same vein as they have done in the series till now.
 
This is the first time two Indian spinners have combined to notch up three pairs of bowling hundreds in successive Test matches at home in the 79-year history of Test cricket in India.
 
A pair of centuries against the name of spinners in the bowling analysis is not a rare feat as bowlers have often struggled against excellent visiting batsmen, or when wickets have not been that easy to obtain.
 
The first instance took place as far back as 1956 in Mumbai, when Jasu Patel, Vinoo Mankad and Subhash Gupte all registered hundreds while some tall scores were obtained by Neil Harvey, Jim Burke and Peter Burge.
 
Gupte and Mankad repeated the feat in 1959 against the rampaging John Holt, Joe Solomon and Collie Smith in Delhi.
 
Down the years, this has been repeated often enough – as many as 46 times. Various combinations of the famous spin quartet of the sixties and seventies have achieved it, followed by the likes of Shivlal Yadav and Dilip Doshi, Maninder Singh with Ravi Shastri and others. Anil Kumble and Harbhajan Singh, too, did it in on as many as 10 occasions, but generally they did have plenty to show in the wickets column for their efforts. Besides, never had the dubious twin tons been made with this amazing regularity.
 
Ashwin and Ojha have collaborated in five pairs of centuries in home Tests so far, the earlier twin hundreds coming against West Indies last year at Kolkata and Mumbai.

Hat-trick of twin centuries by Ashwin and Ojha

Bowler	O	M	R	W	Venue	Opposition	Date
PP Ojha	55	16	120	4	Ahmedabad	England	Nov 15, 2012
R Ashwin	43	9	111	1
R Ashwin	42.3	6	145	2	Mumbai	England	Nov 23, 2012
PP Ojha	40	6	143	5
R Ashwin	52.3	9	183	3	Kolkata	England	Dec 5, 2012
PP Ojha	52	10	142	4

 
 If the current spin twins can carry on their ‘good’ work in the remaining Test, they will create the unbeatable record of bowling centuries in every match of a series.
 
With five such dubious effort in the eight Tests they have bowled together at home so far, the two seem well and truly on the way to the landmark.
 
Given below is the list of all the twin centuries achieved by Indian spinners at home:

Twin bowling centuries by Indian spinners at home

Venue	Opposition	Start	Spinner	O	M	R	W
Mumbai (BS)	Australia	Oct 26, 56	JM Patel	39	10	111	2
			SP Gupte	38	13	115	3
			MH Mankad	46	9	118	1
Delhi	West Indies	Feb 6, 59	MH Mankad	55	12	167	0
			SP Gupte	60	16	144	0
Kanpur	England	Feb 15, 64	BP Gupte	40	9	115	1
			RG Nadkarni	57	22	121	2
Mumbai (BS)	West Indies	Dec 13,66	BS Chandrasekhar	61.5	17	157	7
			S Venkataraghavan	52	17	120	2
Chennai	West Indies	Jan 13, 67	BS Chandrasekhar	46	15	130	4
			EAS Prasanna	41	11	118	2
			EAS Prasanna	37	9	106	3
Mumbai (BS)	England	Feb 6, 73	BS Bedi	69	20	138	3
			BS Chandrasekhar	46.1	8	135	5
Delhi	West Indies	Dec 11, 74	BS Bedi	53	13	146	1
			EAS Prasanna	34	7	147	4
Mumbai	West Indies	Jan 23, 75	S Venkataraghavan	34	6	107	1
			EAS Prasanna	45	5	149	0
			BS Chandrasekhar	35	3	135	1
Kanpur	New Zealand	Nov 18, 76	BS Chandrasekhar	36.5	6	102	3
			S Venkataraghavan	48	9	120	3
Mumbai	West Indies	Dec 1, 78	BS Bedi	36	7	102	1
			BS Chandrasekhar	43	7	116	5
Chennai	Australia	Sep 11, 79	S Venkataraghavan	46	16	101	1
			DR Doshi	43	10	103	6
Bangalore	Pakistan	Nov 21, 79	DR Doshi	52.3	20	102	3
			NS Yadav	39	5	116	2
Chennai	England	Jan 13, 85	L Sivaramakrishnan	44	6	145	1
			RJ Shastri	42	7	143	2
Kanpur	England	Jan 31, 85	G Sharma	60	16	115	3
			L Sivaramakrishnan	54	11	133	0
Chennai	Australia	Sep 18, 86	Maninder Singh	39	8	135	0
			NS Yadav	49.5	9	142	4
Chennai	Pakistan	Feb 3, 87	RJ Shastri	47	8	161	1
			Maninder Singh	59	16	135	5
			NS Yadav	41	3	127	1
Ahmedabad	Pakistan	Mar 4, 87	RJ Shastri	38	8	105	1
			Maninder Singh	54	21	106	1
			NS Yadav	48.3	13	109	4
Kolkata	West Indies	Dec 26, 87	Maninder Singh	36.5	5	111	1
			Arshad Ayub	46	5	146	0
Nagpur	West Indies	Dec 1, 94	SLV Raju	50	11	127	5
			A Kumble	51	15	131	3
Bangalore	Australia	Mar 25, 98	SLV Raju	37	7	118	1
			Harbhajan Singh	23	1	112	2
Bangalore	South Africa	Mar 2, 00	A Kumble	68.4	15	143	6
			M Kartik	50	11	123	3
Nagpur	Zimbabwe	Nov 25,00	Sarandeep Singh	49	10	136	4
			SB Joshi	41	5	153	1
Kolkata	West Indies	Oct 30, 02	Harbhajan Singh	57.3	15	115	5
			A Kumble	54	9	169	3
Mohali	New Zealand	Oct 16, 03	A Kumble	66	18	181	3
			Harbhajan Singh	48	7	149	2
Bangalore	Australia	Oct 6, 04	Harbhajan Singh	41	7	146	5
			A Kumble	39	4	157	3
Chennai	Australia	Oct 14, 04	Harbhajan Singh	46.5	12	108	3
			A Kumble	47	8	133	6
Kanpur	South Africa	Nov 20,04	A Kumble	54	13	131	6
			Harbhajan Singh	44.4	9	127	2
Bangalore	Pakistan	Mar 24, 05	A Kumble	46	8	159	0
			Harbhajan Singh	51.5	9	152	6
Kolkata	Pakistan	Nov 30, 07	Harbhajan Singh	45.5	9	122	5
			A Kumble	47	14	122	3
Bangalore	Pakistan	Dec 8, 07	A Kumble	44	12	116	1
			Harbhajan Singh	38	7	131	2
Chennai	South Africa	Mar 26, 08	A Kumble	45	11	106	2
			Harbhajan Singh	44.5	4	164	5
Bangalore	Australia	Oct 9, 08	Harbhajan Singh	41	8	103	1
			A Kumble	43	6	129	0
Delhi	Australia	Oct 29, 08	A Kumble	43.3	9	112	3
			A Mishra	47	12	144	2
Ahmedabad	Sri Lanka	Nov 16, 09	V Sehwag	40	9	104	5
			Harbhajan Singh	48.4	4	189	2
			A Mishra	58	6	203	1
Mumbai (BS)	Sri Lanka	Dec 2, 09	Harbhajan Singh	32	3	112	4
			PP Ojha	23.4	1	101	3
Nagpur	South Africa	Feb 6, 10	Harbhajan Singh	46	1	166	2
			A Mishra	53	5	140	0
Mohali	Australia	Oct 1, 10	PP Ojha	51.4	16	113	1
			Harbhajan Singh	49	12	114	3
Bangalore	Australia	Oct 9, 10	PP Ojha	42	7	120	3
			Harbhajan Singh	43	3	148	4
Ahmedabad	New Zealand	Nov 4, 10	PP Ojha	53	14	107	4
			Harbhajan Singh	43	7	112	1
Hyderabad (Deccan)	New Zealand	Nov 12, 10	PP Ojha	47.3	14	137	2
			Harbhajan Singh	38	3	117	1
Kolkata	West Indies	Nov 14, 11	PP Ojha	32	5	104	2
			R Ashwin	40	4	137	2
Mumbai	West Indies	Nov 22, 11	PP Ojha	48	10	126	1
			R Ashwin	52.1	6	156	5
Ahmedabad	England	Nov 15, 12	PP Ojha	55	16	120	4
			R Ashwin	43	9	111	1
Mumbai	England	Nov 23, 12	R Ashwin	42.3	6	145	2
			PP Ojha	40	6	143	5
Kolkata	England	Dec-12, 12	R Ashwin	52.3	9	183	3
			PP Ojha	52	10	142	4

 
(Arunabha Sengupta is a cricket historian and Chief Cricket Writer at CricketCountry. He writes about the history and the romance of the game, punctuated often by opinions about modern day cricket, while his post-graduate degree in statistics peeps through in occasional analytical pieces. The author of three novels, he can be followed on Twitter at http://twitter.com/senantix)