Have Jadeja And Kohli Been Equally Good With The Bat Recently?

Everytime Ravindra Jadeja makes runs (or Ashwin makes runs, or Nitish Kumar Reddy makes runs) in the middle-order after the top order has mostly not made big scores, this argument appears in the cricket discussion. As Aadya Sharma of Wisden shows, it is an argument made by journalists and ex-players alike.

Is Jadeja really as good as a top order batter for India? Consider the following.

In Tests since 2000, the batting averages by batting position in result Tests and drawn Tests are given below. Tests tend to draws because wickets are difficult to come by. And this usually means that the conditions offer little assistance to the bowler with the new ball and with the old ball. The pitches are flat. And the batters fill their boots.

India’s current top order batters do this regularly. Kohli averages 72 in draws. KL Rahul 53. Every great Test batter you can think of made a lot of runs in draws. The difference is that Tendulkar played 72 draws in 200 Tests (36% draws). Brisbane was KL Rahul’s 9th draw in his 56th Test (16%), and Kohli’s 22nd draw in his 121st Test (18%). In the World Test Championship era (starting in August 2019 for India), Brisbane was KL Rahul’s 2nd draw in 22 Tests, and Kohli’s 4th draw in 44 Tests.

The conditions when facing the new ball are much harder in result Tests than they are in drawn Tests. The expected averages lie in the middle column of the table above, and not in the column on the right.

Ravindra Jadeja has batted 114 times in Test cricket as of December 19, 2024. Of these, he has started his innings in the first 20 overs of the innings only 4 times. In the 33 innings when he has started within the first 40 overs of the innings, he averages 22.1. In the 40 innings when he has started between overs 41-80, he averages 42. In Tests in the WTC era, these figures tick up to 26.9 (22 innings) and 49.5 (32 innings). Over his career, Kohli averages 43.5 when starts his innings in the first 40 overs of the innings, and 69.0 when he starts his innings after the 40th over. In the WTC era, these figures change to 29.0 and 101.4.

Top order runs, especially in the first innings usually suggest that a draw is likely. Of the 249 Test matches which have begun with a century opening stand in the first innings, 100 have been drawn. Of the 754 Test matches which have had a century opening stand for either the first, second or third wicket in the first innings, 297 (or ~40%) end in a draw.

Taking these figures, together with the vanishing draw in the WTC era and the table of averages by batting position above, its clear that Kohli is a much better bat than Jadeja. Batting in the top order on result pitches is difficult. Batters in the top order bat there because they are better than batters in the three, four or five wickets down positions.

All this begs the question. On result pitches, should teams look for specialist top order batters whose instructions are to see off the new ball to the exclusion of everything else? Pujara, rather than Gill. Aiming for 40(150) rather than 70(120)? Usman Khawaja, Nathan McSweeney and KL Rahul have demonstrated the virtues of the former approach. Is it worth using the top order to get Rishabh Pant or Travis Head to the crease after the 30th over? Gill and Jaiswal don’t play this way. But KL Rahul does. He has batted 470 balls in the first three Tests so far.

Interestingly, Australia have decided to replace McSweeney with the 19 year old Sam Konstas for the fourth Test. In his short first class career so far, Konstas scores at 52 runs per 100 balls faced. In contrast, McSweeney scores at 42 runs per 100 balls faced. Australia appear to have chosen a more expansive strokemaker to replace McSweeney. Though, given Konstas’s age and relative first class inexperience - if he makes his debut in the Melbourne Test, it will be only his 12th first class match - his selection may be one of those where the selectors think the player has just too much promise to be kept out. David Warner’s debut Test was his 19th first class match.

India are unlikely to move Jaiswal, Gill or Kohli out of their positions for the rest of this series. They will hope that KL Rahul’s luck continues to hold. On result pitches, top order batters need it, especially when the fast bowling is as good as Australia’s.