Hardik Pandya's Test career is a thing of the past, but as the Indian team embarks on a new period of transition, Naman Agarwal wonders what could have been.
Every all-rounder dreams of being two players in one. Very few are actually that in the truest sense, and even fewer among those bowl seam – there’s always a dominant trait that stands out over the other.
But when Hardik Pandya declared, “When I bowl, I am a bowler; when I bat, I am a batsman”, during the 2018 England tour, he wasn’t really exaggerating.
By then, he had already been earmarked as India’s long-awaited flagbearer of that breed, and comparisons with Kapil Dev, the ultimate benchmark, had started springing up.
Unfortunately, he didn’t play a Test thereafter, and is unlikely to ever again.
Hardik Pandya, still one of India's great Test regrets
Pandya played 11 Tests in a 13-month window between July 2017 and August 2018, averaging 31 with both bat and ball. Not bad, but nothing extraordinary purely numbers-wise.
However, few had such a unique skill-set and a knack for turning Tests around, perfectly matching his rapidly growing white-ball career. When Hardik was listed, the balance of India’s lineup felt right. It ended up being a big what-if.
In the one-year period, Pandya saw himself promoted from No.8 to No.6, scored a hundred in Sri Lanka, hit a counter-attacking 90-odd in South Africa, and took a five-for in England. All this while still finding his feet as an international cricketer at 25.
His hundred and five-for proved he could win Tests with both bat and ball - a feat only seven Indian seam-bowling all-rounders have achieved, and none after Pandya. Between those bursts of brilliance, a rare trait stood out: reliability across both disciplines.
Pandya averaged eight overs per innings with the ball. Outside Asia, that number rose to 9.5. Even excluding his Trent Bridge five-for, he still picked up 12 wickets in 18 innings. With the bat, he averaged 29 runs off 40 balls per innings.
Among the six other Indian seam-bowling all-rounders with at least one hundred and one five-for, no one had both - a higher batting average and a lower bowling average than Pandya. Even on days he was not exceptional - which can be most days in Test cricket - he still offered assurance with both bat and ball.
India tried several players in this role after Kapil Dev, but no one fit the bill as well as Pandya. Irfan Pathan played 29 Tests, but struggled to carve out an identity, eventually playing his last red-ball game for India aged 23. Ajit Agarkar famously scored a Test hundred at Lord’s, but ended up with a batting average of 16 and bowling average of 47. Bhuvneshwar Kumar was a handy tailender who could stick around; his career lasted only 21 Tests. Sanjay Bangar was primarily a batter who could roll his arm over.
Also read: Irfan Pathan: I could have been India’s best-ever all-rounder in ODIs
Following his Trent Bridge five-for, Pandya had to categorically state that he didn’t like the comparisons: "I don't want to be Kapil Dev. Let me be Hardik Pandya. I'm good at being Hardik Pandya. I've played 40 one-day internationals and now 10 Tests as Hardik Pandya. He was a great of his era, but stop comparing me to Kapil Dev. I would be happy if you don't."
It was evident why the comparisons were being made.
Indian seam-bowling all-rounders with at least one 100 and 5-for in Tests
| Player | Avg Diff | Matches | Runs | Bat avg | 100s | Wickets | Bowl avg | 5-for |
| Kapil Dev | 1.40 | 131 | 5,248 | 31.05 | 8 | 434 | 29.64 | 23 |
| Hardik Pandya | 0.23 | 11 | 532 | 31.29 | 1 | 17 | 31.05 | 1 |
| Irfan Pathan | -0.68 | 29 | 1105 | 31.57 | 1 | 100 | 32.36 | 7 |
| Manoj Prabhakar | -4.64 | 39 | 1600 | 32.65 | 1 | 96 | 37.3 | 3 |
| Lala Amarnath | -8.52 | 24 | 878 | 24.38 | 1 | 45 | 32.91 | 2 |
| Gulabrai Ramchand | -21.73 | 33 | 1180 | 24.58 | 2 | 41 | 46.31 | 1 |
| Ajit Agarkar | -30.53 | 26 | 571 | 16.79 | 1 | 58 | 47.32 | 1 |
Injuries, though, ensured that the comparison of potential never materialised into comparison of long-term performance. A stress fracture of the back right after the England tour saw Pandya stretchered off the ground during an Asia Cup game. With that one blow, his Test career also silently slipped away.
Hopes of revival surfaced on a few occasions after that, but it was never realistic. In Ravi Shastri’s words, who has seen him from close quarters as India’s former head coach, “his body cannot cope with Test cricket”.
Also read: Hello Hardik Pandya, reckon you still have your Test whites around?
As India begin to struggle for balance, Pandya's absence pinches harder
What makes Pandya’s absence sting more is that beyond, or rather, because of his individual skill set, he comes bearing a bigger gift: team balance.
When he got injured mid-way through the 2023 ODI World Cup, India had to completely overhaul the structure of their lineup for the rest of the tournament. It exposed them to the risk of capitulation with both bat and ball, which eventually happened in the final.
In Tests, Pandya could alternate between being the second and the fourth seamer, between batting at eight to add depth and batting at six to allow the team to play the extra bowler. He was essentially a cheat code - two cricketers in one - much like Ravindra Jadeja is now.
But even Jadeja, for all his value, hasn’t been able to single-handedly solve India’s overseas team combination woes.
India have either had to sacrifice bowling quality to pick an extra seamer who could bat, compromise on batting depth to pick the best fast bowlers, or let go of the fourth seamer idea altogether and pick a second spin-bowling all-rounder like R Ashwin or Washington Sundar even when conditions haven’t been conducive to spin.
The recent Border-Gavaskar Trophy significantly highlighted the absence of someone like Pandya.
India handed a debut to Nitish Kumar Reddy at the start of the series at No.8, hoping he could be the seam-bowling all-rounder they needed. Reddy grew in stature as a batter as the series progressed, even scoring a hundred in the fourth Test at MCG, but only bowled 44 overs across the five games - fewer than five per innings.
Five wickets at an average of 38 isn’t terrible, but he played a very limited role as a fourth seamer. By the end of the tour, India, searching for bowling control and batting depth, fielded two spinners in unhelpful conditions. It didn’t hold.
Between Pandya’s departure and Reddy’s arrival, Shardul Thakur was the only Indian seamer who offered any batting ability. Like Pandya, he too has 11 Tests to his name and has put in some memorable performances with both bat and ball. But he hasn’t been able to crack the reliability code: a batting average of 19 - despite four half-centuries - and an economy rate of 3.64 underline that inconsistency.
Also read: Welcome to the cult of Hardik Pandya
India are entering a new phase in Test cricket following the retirement of three stalwarts, with no clarity on who their next long-term leader will be. That’s another gap Pandya might have filled. He’s 31 now, at the peak of his powers, and has enough captaincy pedigree across international white-ball and IPL cricket.
Among contemporary cricketers, Pandya’s potential could perhaps be best compared to Ben Stokes. Both genuine all-rounders who could break games with bat and ball across formats. Both charismatic leaders whose self-belief is always running through the roof, inspiring teammates around them.
The risk a player like this shields the team from simply cannot be overstated. Last year, when Stokes was injured for the Sri Lanka Tests, England had to move Chris Woakes up from No.8 to 7, significantly lengthening their tail. England managed to win the series 2-1, but structurally, they were always compromised.
Unfortunately for India, Pandya managed to enjoy only a tenth of Stokes’s Test career.
Pandya will continue to prosper in white-ball cricket; having already played a stellar role in the T20 World Cup win last year, he’ll be protected by India for big events. But the little teaser in whites sparked a dream, one that remains unfulfilled, and impossible to forget.
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