India's Greatest Cricket Allrounders

Look down the list of India's best allrounders and one thing is immediately obvious: almost all of them bowl spin. Vinoo Mankad was a slow left-armer. Ravi Shastri began as one. Ravichandran Ashwin bowls off-breaks and Ravindra Jadeja slow left-arm. Yuvraj Singh's wickets came from left-arm spin bowled at part-time pace. Deepti Sharma bowls off-breaks. In ninety years of Test cricket India has produced exactly two allrounders of the first rank who bowled fast, and one of them played eleven Tests.

That is not a coincidence and it is not a limitation of Indian cricketers. It follows directly from the conditions. A batter who wants a second skill in India learns to bowl spin, because spin is what the surfaces reward, what the coaches can teach, and what will get him bowling in the fourth innings on a turning pitch. A batter who learns to bowl fast-medium in Mumbai or Chennai will find that six overs into a Ranji match the ball has gone soft and the pitch is offering him nothing.

So the Indian allrounder is a different animal from the English or Australian version, and the list below is organised around that rather than around a ranking of career averages. It also includes the woman with the best allround World Cup performance in the game's history, which is not a courtesy inclusion.

Mankad, and the template

Vinoo Mankad played 44 Tests between 1946 and 1959 as an opening batter and a slow left-arm bowler, and he set the pattern everything since has followed. He was the first Indian to reach a thousand Test runs and a hundred Test wickets, and he completed that double in 23 Tests — a world record that stood for close to a quarter of a century.

He made five Test centuries with a highest score of 231 and took 162 wickets with eight five-wicket hauls. His best match was at Lord's in 1952, where he scored 184 in India's second innings and took five for 196 in England's first, becoming the first cricketer in more than thirty years to make a century and take five wickets in the same Test. In 1956 he and Pankaj Roy put on 413 for the first wicket against New Zealand, a world record opening partnership that lasted 52 years.

He is also, unfairly, the only Indian cricketer whose name became a verb. On the 1947-48 tour of Australia he ran out Bill Brown at the non-striker's end for backing up too far, entirely within the laws, and the dismissal has carried his name ever since. He received the Padma Bhushan in 1973 and entered the ICC Hall of Fame in 2021.

Kapil Dev, the exception

Kapil Dev is the only Indian fast-bowling allrounder of undisputed greatness and the best allrounder India has produced by any measure. He took 434 Test wickets at 29.64, with a best of nine for 83 and 23 five-wicket hauls, and scored 5,248 runs at 31.05 with eight centuries. He remains the only cricketer in history with more than 400 Test wickets and more than 5,000 Test runs, and he held the world record for Test wickets when he retired in 1994.

What separates him from every other name here is that he would have been picked for either discipline alone. He was India's best fast bowler for sixteen years and its most dangerous middle-order hitter for several of them, and he did it while bowling on surfaces that gave a quick bowler nothing — the problem set out in the guide to India's fast bowling evolution.

He was also, by the standards of allrounders anywhere, remarkably durable. A knee operation in 1984 cost him pace and he adapted rather than stopped.

Shastri, who batted everywhere

Ravi Shastri's numbers look like a good player's rather than a great one's: 80 Tests, 3,830 runs at 35.79 with eleven centuries, and 151 wickets at 40.96. The bowling average is the weak point and the reason he ranks below the names above him.

His case is about function. Shastri batted in every position from one to ten across his career, having started in the lower order and been promoted to open within eighteen months of his debut. Tall, upright and defensive, with a flick off the pads that acquired its own nickname, he was the player India used to solve whatever was broken that week.

Two performances stand out. In January 1985 he hit six sixes in an over in a first-class match, equalling Garry Sobers's feat. Weeks later, at the World Championship of Cricket in Australia, he made 182 runs and took eight wickets and was named Champion of Champions, collecting an Audi that became part of Indian cricket folklore. Both came from a domestic and international season in which he was the most useful cricketer in the country.

Yuvraj Singh and the white-ball version

Yuvraj Singh's Test career was modest — 40 matches, 1,900 runs at 33.92, ten wickets — and his standing rests almost entirely on limited-overs cricket, where he was for a decade the most valuable allround cricketer India had.

He scored 8,701 one-day international runs at 36.55 with fourteen centuries and took 111 wickets, and in Twenty20 internationals he made 1,177 runs and took 29 wickets at 17.82. Two performances defined him. In the 2007 World Twenty20 he hit six sixes in an over off Stuart Broad and reached fifty from twelve balls, then the fastest in international cricket. And in the fifty-over World Cup of 2011, which India won at home, he scored 362 runs with a century and four fifties and took fifteen wickets, becoming the first allrounder to combine 300 runs with fifteen wickets in a single World Cup and taking the player-of-the-tournament award.

His left-arm spin was never his primary skill and he was never selected as a bowler. That he took fifteen wickets in a World Cup anyway is the clearest illustration of how much a part-time spinner is worth in subcontinental conditions.

Player	Format	Runs	Wickets	Distinguishing claim
Vinoo Mankad	Tests	Five centuries, top score 231	162	Double in 23 Tests; 413 with Roy
Kapil Dev	Tests	5,248 at 31.05	434 at 29.64	Only man with 400 wickets and 5,000 runs
Ravi Shastri	Tests	3,830 at 35.79	151 at 40.96	Batted in every position from one to ten
Yuvraj Singh	ODIs	8,701 at 36.55	111	362 runs and 15 wickets in the 2011 World Cup
R Ashwin	Tests	Six centuries	537 at 23.95	Eleven player-of-the-series awards
R Jadeja	Tests	4,095 at 38.27	348 at 25.11	Highest Test score by an Indian at No. 7 or lower
Hardik Pandya	T20Is	2,128 at 29.15	107 at 26.70	First seam allrounder to 1,000 runs and 100 T20I wickets
Deepti Sharma	ODIs	2,771, top score 188	166	First cricketer with 200 runs and 20 wickets in a World Cup

Ashwin and Jadeja, who redefined the job

The modern pair are the most successful allround combination India has fielded, and both are better bowlers than Shastri and better batters than most specialist bowlers.

Ravichandran Ashwin finished with 537 Test wickets at 23.95 in 106 matches, the second-highest for India, along with 37 five-wicket hauls — the second most in Test history. He was the fastest Indian to every wicket milestone from 50 to 500. He also scored six Test centuries and fourteen fifties, which is a genuine batting record rather than a footnote, and he took 29 wickets in a four-match series against Australia in 2013. His eleven player-of-the-series awards in Tests are the most by any cricketer, level with Muttiah Muralitharan. He retired from international cricket in December 2024, during a series in Australia.

Ravindra Jadeja has 4,095 Test runs at 38.27 with six centuries and 348 wickets at 25.11 from 89 matches, plus 2,905 runs and 232 wickets in one-day internationals. His unbeaten 175 in March 2022 is the highest Test score by an Indian batting at No. 7 or below, passing a Kapil Dev record that had stood 36 years. Before any of that he became the first Indian to score three first-class triple centuries, making 314, 303 not out and 331 in the Ranji Trophy.

Between them they have played most of India's home Tests of the past decade, and their combination — an off-spinner and a left-arm spinner who both bat in the top eight — is the most direct expression of the argument at the top of this page. The bowling tradition they belong to is set out in the guide to India's spin bowling tradition.

Hardik Pandya, the second exception

Hardik Pandya is the only Indian seam-bowling allrounder since Kapil to hold a settled place in a national side, and his Test career is eleven matches long, which tells you how difficult the role is here. In those eleven Tests he made 532 runs at 31.29 and took 17 wickets with a best of five for 28.

His record is a white-ball one. In 131 Twenty20 internationals he has scored 2,128 runs and taken 107 wickets at 26.70, becoming the first fast-bowling allrounder anywhere to combine a thousand runs with a hundred wickets in the format, and the first Indian allrounder ranked number one in the Twenty20 international rankings. At the T20 World Cup of 2024 he took eleven wickets and scored 144 runs, and in the final he took three wickets, including two of South Africa's most dangerous batters, and bowled the last over. He also captained Gujarat Titans to the Indian Premier League title in the franchise's first season.

The honest assessment is that Pandya's body has determined the shape of his career. Back injuries repeatedly interrupted his fast bowling, and a seam-bowling allrounder who cannot bowl twenty overs in a day is not a Test cricketer, however good he is in a Twenty20 international.

Deepti Sharma, and the best allround World Cup anyone has played

Deepti Sharma has the single most impressive allround performance in the history of any World Cup, men's or women's. At the 2025 Women's Cricket World Cup, which India won, she scored 215 runs and took 22 wickets in nine matches and was named player of the tournament — the first cricketer of either sex to record 200 runs and 20 wickets in one edition.

The career around it is substantial: from 124 one-day internationals she has 2,771 runs, with a highest score of 188, and 166 wickets, with a best return of six for 20 against Sri Lanka. She bats left-handed and bowls right-arm off-breaks, which is a rarer combination than it sounds. In 2017 she and Poonam Raut put on 320 for the first wicket against Ireland, a world record opening partnership in women's one-day internationals, Sharma making the 188.

She was also in the India side beaten in the 2017 World Cup final, eight years before winning one. The longer arc of that team is in the guide to India women's cricket history.

The order, and the near misses

Kapil Dev is first and it is not close: he is the only name here who was among the world's best at both disciplines simultaneously. Mankad is second, on the strength of a double reached in 23 Tests and a century-and-five-wickets Test at Lord's in 1952. Ashwin and Jadeja follow, in either order depending on whether you weight bowling volume or batting reliability. Deepti Sharma's peak is higher than either of theirs and her career is shorter. Yuvraj and Shastri come next, then Pandya, whose Twenty20 record is exceptional and whose red-ball career never happened.

The near misses are worth naming. Irfan Pathan swung the ball both ways and batted usefully, and took a hat-trick in the opening over of a Test at Karachi in 2006, but his career shortened as his pace fell away. Axar Patel has a strong Test bowling record at home and has not yet had a comparable opportunity abroad. Manoj Prabhakar and Madan Lal were selected as allrounders in eras when the alternative was picking a specialist who could do neither. Polly Umrigar bowled more than his reputation suggests.

For the specialists rather than the dual-purpose cricketers, and for the domestic competitions, grounds and pathways behind all of these careers, start at the cricket in India hub.

Sources and method

Career figures are taken from published Test, one-day international and Twenty20 international records for each player named, and match and series figures from the scorecards of the matches described. Records claimed as firsts — Mankad's double in 23 Tests, Kapil's 400-wicket and 5,000-run combination, Yuvraj's 2011 World Cup double, Pandya's Twenty20 milestone, Deepti Sharma's 2025 World Cup double — are as recorded by the ICC and in contemporary published statistics. Aggregates for players still active may since have moved and are given as of the most recent completed series. The closing order is an editorial judgement, not the output of a rating system, and nothing here is computed from our own datasets.