'I couldn't even move, my daughter had to pull my shorts up' - R Ashwin reveals his battle with pain during Sydney Test against Australia

Indian off-spinner R Ashwin has opened up on what transpired and all he had to undergo a day before his steadfast, match-saving knock in Sydney in the third Test against Australia during the 2020-21 Border-Gavaskar Trophy.

Ashwin was one of the chief architects of India’s series-saving heist at the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG) when the team was struggling to even properly slot an XI in order with injuries raining from every corner.

Set an unlikely 407-run target in the third Test, India resumed at 98/2 on the fifth morning, but once they lost Rishabh Pant and Cheteshwar Pujara in quick succession, Australia looked increasingly set to gain a 2-1 lead, after having won in Adelaide and lost Melbourne, with the series finale at their then-fortress Brisbane to go.

Ashwin would bat for 190 minutes, consuming 128 balls for his 39, assisted in no small cause by also-injured Hanuma Vihari’s 237-minute, 161-ball vigil to help India muster an unlikely draw. The Ashwin-Vihari duo endured a hostile barrage of short-pitched bowling by quality Australian quicks who seemed thirsty for their blood, but as fate would have it, their bravery was rewarded, as India went on to retain the trophy after the historic Brisbane triumph.

It was the worst night of my life: R Ashwin

Ashwin, in a recent interaction with journalist Boria Majumdar, revealed he was nearly reduced to a vegetative state thanks to a back spasm, one that had forced his wife Prithi Ashwin to ask how could he have even thought of “playing a game”.

“It [back spasm] was very freakish. I was wincing in lower-back pain after I had hurt myself during practice. Nitin [the physio] gave my heavy painkillers on Day 4 and I kept bowling. I bowled two overs at Steven Smith and Marnus Labuschagne, which took me to cross the pain barrier – I got used to the pain. I told Ajinkya Rahane [India’s stand-in captain] and Rohit Sharma that if you stop me, I won’t be able to bowl again. So, I went on [to bowl at a stretch] for 14 overs,” he told.

“Australia declared later and I went back, but little did I know that I would have the worst night of my life. When I went after dinner to lie down, my back did not go down. I put a towel underneath my back, held my hip up and went to sleep. The next morning when I woke up, my mind was telling me to get up but I couldn’t. I was shouting and yelling; the children helped me get up, but I couldn’t.

“I crawled outside the door and kept yelling for the for the physio. I went into a hot shower, so that’s when my back started warming up. I don’t know how I went to the game. My daughter held my shorts – she just pushed the shorts up, and as she pushed up my shorts, I was tearing up. My wife asked, ‘You are going to play a game?’. I said: ‘I have to’,” Ashwin added.

Neither Ashwin nor Vihari were a part of the fourth and final Test at Gabba, which India won defying all odds to seal the series, but their defiance in Sydney is deservedly etched in the cricketing folklore.