It is splitting hairs, but Sehwag is best described as a great player of limited impact. For all 10 of Sehwag's 150+ scores, India have only won one Test and the average first innings score in these games is 493. People asked what was the point of Brian Lara's 400 and so too, where is the meaning in big scores if they never win you anything?
India don't get the lion's share of sporting pitches, but they still don't draw two thirds of their games, which is what happens for more than two thirds of the matches when Sehwag gets a hundred. He has scored 48% of his runs in the 22 matches drawn and only 27% of his runs in the 20 matches won.
When India do win a Test, they can sometimes count on Sehwag. He is certainly not the worst player in the world and in the midst of a session, his entertainment value certainly seems more important than the match result. However, for a win, India have looked largely to Tendulkar and Dravid, but have also been able to count on Laxman and Ganguly more.
I don`t think you can blame Sehwag one bit for that.It is not as if he scores his big hundreds,double and triples at a SR of 60 whereas Brian Lara`s 400 was scored at quite a slow pace which took a lot of time out of the match.
He scores at close to a SR of 100 or even quicker in case of his triple hundred at Chennai. What that in fact does is give the bowler more time to capture those 20 wickets to win a test match.
You`ll see that if anyone can buy India some extra time to force a result on those dead tracks , it is Sehwag with his ultra-fast innings rather than the other batsmen in the sid who are far more conventional and score at a slower pace.
The others may score runs but may not be scoring them at a quick enough rate to help the team force a result on dead tracks.
What I just described was evident in the only test of all his 150+ scores that India won, at Multan where he scored a quick 300 which gave us enough time to bowl Pakistan out twice.
His hundred at Trent Bridge in 2002 came on a juicy first day track which had quite a lot for the bowlers under overcast conditions. I helped us post a decent score and eventually draw the game.
Yet another of his hundreds which ended up as a draw was the 180 against the West Indies in St.Lucia 2006. Again, it was a very quick innings and almost got us a victory inspite of the whole of Day 4 being washed out.
His hundred at Adelaide earlier this year was crucial in ensuring that we did not lose the test match. We could well have gone on to lose that one had it not been for Sehwag`s 150+ score in the second innings.Look at what the others scored in that inning.
What this proves is that the stats as always do not tell the whole story in this case. The stats do point out that Sehwag`s biggest scores may have come on flat tracks but do not tell that he is India`s best chance to force a result on flat tracks.
aditya123 added 3 Minutes and 7 Seconds later...
For me , Sehwag is in fact the most vital cog of our test batting lineup. If he does manage to give us a decent start, the fab four usually score big as we saw at Perth and Adelaide.
Even his 28 in the first inning at Perth and the 50 in the second innings played a vital role in getting us the win.
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