Ravichandran Ashwin has surpassed cricketing icons Sachin Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag with his sixth Player-of-the-Series award in Tests, the most of any Indian player.
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Pakistan were named the number one side and the West Indies at the Port of Spain was left.
The former dismissed Leon Johnson (9), caught at short leg by Rohit Sharma, and the latter bowled Darren Bravo (10) with a lovely off-break delivery. Here, too, the covers did not protect large parts of the field, and the super sopper was made to stop operating for fear it would do further damage to the soft patches that persisted into day five despite no more rain falling.
India lost their no.1 Test ranking, which they had gained last week following Australia’s 0-3 loss in Sri Lanka.
But their recent performances in unfamiliar conditions in England, where they were victorious in Tests at Lord’s and The Oval to draw the series 2-2, have given the tourists belief that they can win away from their adopted home in the UAE. Pakistan has dropped to as low as seventh three times in the past 13 years with the last being in January/February 2010 following the three-Test series in Australia – 10 months before Misbah took charge of the side.
Ashwin’s award-winning streak began in his debut Test series, against the West Indies in 2011, when he claimed 22 wickets for the series as well as his maiden Test century. Four consecutive days were washed out despite long periods of sunshine and the desperate attempts of ground staff to make the surface playable with shovels, pitchforks and leaf blowers.
Misbah was delighted to become the first Pakistan captain to inspire his side to the top of the Test rankings, when he said: “There is no greater feeling than to achieve the number-one ranking in the most traditional and purest format of the sport”. India won the four-test series 2-0 but surrendered top spot in the rankings.
South Africa-New Zealand and West Indies-India Tests were both interrupted by rain.
This is the first occasion on which either Kingsmead or the Queen’s Park Oval have been rated “poor”, meaning that under clause 4.1 of the monitoring process, the sanction will be a warning and/or a fine of up to 15,000 U.S. dollars (£11,350) along with a “directive for appropriate corrective action”.
“We have jointly launched an investigation to determine what occurred with a view to remedying the situation so that this does not occur in the future”, he added.
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“The reports have been forwarded to Cricket South Africa (CSA) and the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB), who now have 14 days to provide their responses”.
