The veteran Indian spinner, Ravichandran Ashwin paid the ultimate compliment to the Indian batter, Shreyas Iyer and said that the 28-year-old has been the backbone of the Indian Test team’s batting order. Iyer has been witnessing a purple patch in Tests since last year as he was second in the highest run-getters list for India with 422 runs to his name. He was behind Rishabh Pant who had scored 680 runs.

Shreyas Iyer was India’s highest run-scorer in ODIs in 2022 and managed to score as many as 724 runs in the format. This helped him make it to the ICC’s ODI Team of 2022 alongside teammate Mohammed Siraj. Pant will be out of action for a considerable amount of time after his car accident in December last year.

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Speaking on his YouTube channel, as quoted by News 18, R Ashwin stated that Iyer has been India’s go-to batter alongside the wicketkeeper-batter in the past couple of years. The off-spinner then termed the 28-year-old as the backbone of the Indian Test team’s batting order and said he was going to be a crucial player in Pant’s absence.

R Ashwin said, “Shreyas Iyer has been India’s go-to Test batter alongside Rishabh Pant in the last couple of years. That in itself is a lesser compliment for him. He has been the backbone of this batting order. He is going to be a crucial player for India in Pant’s absence.”

India could be without Iyer’s services for the first Test in the Border-Gavaskar trophy against Australia as the batter is yet to recover from a back issue. The injury had kept the 28-year-old out of the ODI series against New Zealand and he was working on it at the National Cricket Academy.

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R Ashwin provided an update and said Iyer had taken an injection for the injury.

Elaborating the same, Ashwin said, “He (Shreyas) has a problem in his back and has taken an injection, it seems.”