Border-Gavaskar Trophy: From Axar Patel to Nathan Lyon, here are the top five players of the series

The end of the fifth day at the Narendra Modi stadium in Ahmedabad put curtains down on the marquee 2023 Border-Gavaskar series with India winning it (2-1) for the fourth straight time. Continuing their dominance at home the Indian spinners fared the best not only with the ball but also with the bat in hand. In this piece we will look at the top five players from the recently-concluded India vs Australia series.

• Ravindra Jadeja

It’s not easy being Ravindran Jadeja. From remaining out of cricket for more than five months to winning the Player of the Series award for an all-round show upon returning to the side straightaway, only Jadeja could have done it.

The left-arm maestro picked 22 wickets and scored 135 runs across four Tests to remain on top of the all-rounder's chart in the ICC rankings.

In his first game since August 2022, Jadeja returned with a five-for in the first innings in Nagpur. He mounted pressure on Australia with a fighting 70 in the first innings before picking up two more wickets in the secondinnings to help India win the Test by an inning and 132 runs.

His best performance, however, came in the following Test in Delhi where he picked his career-best figures of seven for 42 in the second innings, finishing with match figures of ten for 110, bagging yet another player of the match award.

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• Axar Patel

If there was an award for the game-changing inning in a Test, Axar would have won it not once, not twice but thrice, and that too for his batting and not bowling. India’s best player in this Border-Gavaskar series, Axar Patel impressed everyone with his batting display.

Rather known and ranked as a specialised spinner, what Axar achieved with the bat in hand even promoted the Aussies to take a leaf out of his book.

In Nagpur Axar scored a counter-attacking 84, whereas, in Delhi the left-handed batter completed yet another fifty, hitting 74 in the first innings. After a rare failure in the Indore Test, Axar returned with a 113-ball 79 in India’s first innings in the final Test. What’s exciting about these fifties – Axar scored the majority of these runs while India was struggling to put up runs on the board.

Meanwhile, given these scores, Axar was not only India’s second-best batter in the series in terms of runs scored but was also the third-highest run-scorer (264 runs at an average of 88) after Usman Khawaja and Virat Kohli. He didn’t fare any well in bowling though picking up just three wickets.

• Ravichandran Ashwin

There cannot be a discussion of the best players in a series in India without mentioning Ravi Ashwin’s name. The veteran spinner, for the nth time in his Test career, had an impactful series with the ball in hand.

The off-spin legend was again the thorn in the flesh of the Aussies as he won the Player of the Series award alongside Jadeja for picking up the most wickets (25) this time.

Throughout the series, Ashwin remained on the top of Australia and while he troubled them big time on the rank-turners in the first three Tests, he left an impression with a six-wicket haul in the final Test in Ahmedabad where the pitch refused to assist the spinners.

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• Nathan Lyon

Called the best overseas spinner to have travelled to India in a very long time by the India captain Rohit Sharma, Nathan Lyon delivered what was expected out of him.

Equalled with Jadeja in the wickets tally (22) in this series, Lyon, following a rusty start in the first match, tore into India’s middle-order in the Indore Test with his second eight-wicket haul in an inning in India.

Despite being India's nemesis, even in Australia, Lyon got good support from the newcomers in Todd Murphy and Matthew Kuhnemann throughout the series as they returned with 14 and nine wickets, respectively. Meanwhile, with 116 wickets In the Border-Gavaskar series and 482 in Tests, Lyon staysahead of India’s Ashwin on both lists.

• Usman Khawaja

After warming benches during his previous two India tours, the left-handed Usman Khawaja finally got his turn this time, and he made the most of his chance. In a team full of batting superstars, Usman came good after early jitters in the first Test and remained on top by scoring the most runs among all batters.

While Ashwin had his number on most of the occasions, Khawaja shined on two separate instances – one during the first innings in Delhi, where he scored a fighting 81 and then during the final Test in Ahmedabad, where he registered his maiden hundred on the Indian soil, hitting an incredible 180.