Ranking India's Top 10 Test match winners of all time

1.Rahul Dravid

Yes. You read it right. This man pips even the man called the ‘God of cricket’ to emerge as the greatest match-winner for India in Tests. And let us analyze as to why Rahul Dravid beats Tendulkar to the top spot.

5131 out of Dravid’s 13288 Test runs have come in a win for India, which translates to a percentage of 38.61%. On the other hand, 5946 out of Tendulkar’s 15921 runs in Tests resulted in a victory, which translates to 37.35%. Still not convinced? Out of Dravid’s 36 Test hundreds, 15 have resulted in an Indian victory, which means that 41.67% of his centuries have resulted in an Indian win. On the other hand, 20 out of Tendulkar’s 51 Test hundreds have come in a win, which translates to 39.22%.

In a Test win for India, Dravid averaged in excess of 60 against 7 out of the 9 opponents that he played against. On the other hand, Tendulkar averaged in excess of 60 against just 4 out of 9 opponents he played against. Another factor that allows Dravid to bag the top spot is, if not for him, India would have not achieved three of their greatest Test match triumphs. In the year 2001, at the Eden Gardens against Australia, Dravid scored a scintillating 180, to give excellent support to Laxman (Laxman scored 281).

Two years later in the year 2003, Dravid led from the front with the bat and scored 233 at Adelaide to allow India to beat Australia in Australia in a Test match for the first time since 1981. In 2004, ‘The Wall’ scored 270 in Rawalpindi, to help India to win their first and only Test series against Pakistan on Pakistan soil. With such stunning contributions to Indian cricket in Tests, Dravid emerges as the greatest match-winner ever produced by India in the longest format of the game.

Note: All the stats have been taken from Cricinfo, Cricbuzz and Howstat cricket and have been updated as on 3rd February 2021