R Ashwin is a tall offspinner who took the soduku ball, a finger-flicked tennis-ball legbreak, from the streets of Chennai and used it effectively in international cricket on a bigger, harder cricket ball. His inspiration was Ajantha Mendis' carrom ball. Even before Mendis had played for Sri Lanka and bamboozled India's heavyweight Test line-up in one series, this 21-year-old saw him in a game in Chennai and went home convinced it could be done with a cricket ball too. In his first season of first-class cricket back then, Ashwin put his long fingers to tireless work on that variation. Soon after Mendis had became a brief phenomenon, Ashwin unleashed it in Twenty20 cricket.
That carrom ball, an arm ball just as good, his control over his offbreaks, and a sharp brain made Ashwin a quintessential limited-overs spinner. For his IPL franchise, he opened the bowling, bowled at death, came on when wickets were required, and was the Man of the Series in the 2010 Champions League played in South Africa. In fact, Ashwin is one of the rare players who actually came up through the IPL and was good enough to hold his own in bigger forms of cricket.

He had been playing the Ranji Trophy well before the IPL and the Champions League, but didn't lead the charts. His success in T20 cricket earned him a call-up to the national side. He made his international debut in Zimbabwe in 2010, went on to play a big role in the home whitewash of New Zealand, and it wasn't surprising to see him in the Indian squad for the 2011 World Cup. While India went for the experience of Harbhajan Singh in most of the games in the tournament, Ashwin replaced his childhood hero in ODIs soon after. A good show there won him a call-up for a home Test against West Indies, and he justified his selection immediately, taking nine wickets in his maiden appearance, the second-highest by an Indian debutant after Narendra Hirwani's 16, and winning the Man-of-the-Match award. By the time he finished the three-Test series, he had 22 wickets, a Test century, and the tag of leading spinner for India.
Sidharth Monga