I did not settle for anything and I constantly look to improve – Ravichandran Ashwin

Ace Indian spin all-rounder Ravichandran Ashwin believes that adversity brings the best out of him. Regarded as someone who’s always looking to tweak and improve his craft, Ashwin also said that he will quit the sport the day he loses his urge to improve and get better. This forward-thinking attitude has brought him rich dividends throughout his career and especially in the longest format of the sport.

“The beauty about Test cricket is you are always aspiring to be perfect but you can settle for excellence, so that’s pretty much I think I do,” Ashwin was quoted as saying by the ICC ahead of the ongoing World Test Championship final between India and New Zealand.

“I think whatever I have achieved so far in my career is because of that attitude, did not settle for anything, constantly looking to improve.”

“I maintained that if I don’t like doing different things and if I lose the patience to do something new or get satisfied then I might not play the sport anymore,” he said.

Ashwin has picked up 410 Test wickets so far in his career with his latest victim arriving in the form of New Zealand’s Tom Latham in the World Test Championship Final. Ashwin added that although he doesn’t like controversy, he doesn’t shy away from giving it back on the pitch with his performance.

“It’s not like that I enjoy controversy but I enjoy a fight and that pretty much sums up why I am here,” he said.

The 34-year-old also added that he doesn’t celebrate victories as much as he ‘ideally should.’ Victory is coincidental to planning and practice so he prefers to sit and analyse what can be done better instead.

He also admitted that he doesn’t like to talk about his own performances since playing the sport is his profession.

“I don’t really read or dwell on my performances to be very honest. To be brutally honest I just hate the fact that I am who I am because of what I do. In India you get a lot of adulation but I am just another normal person who finds peace and happiness playing the sport,” he said

The man from Chennai considers it a privilege that he gets paid well for playing cricket and can feed his family because of the sport. It also gives him a meaning to live. Therefore, he doesn’t have a lot of time for people who ‘rate or do not rate’ him since its’ their personal opinion.