“Ni ena periya Prasanna va? (are you the great (EAS) Prasanna?)” This was a question that a young Washington faced from his father, M Sundar, in 2016 over a dinner table in Kolkata.
In the lead-up to that year’s Under-19 World Cup, as Washington was leaking runs in the preparatory fixtures in Kolkata, Sundar only found out what was wrong once he saw his son bowling at the venue. “He was tossing them up like a classical off-spinner would do. And Sarfaraz Khan hit him for three-four sixes over mid-wicket in one over. I couldn’t believe what he was doing,” he tells The Indian Express.
That night, Sundar would drop in to the team hotel to have a quiet word or two to remind Washington what he originally is. “When he joined the team for the camp, they wanted him to flight the ball and toss it up. He is not Prasanna or (R) Ashwin. Washington’s strength is constantly attacking the stumps and bowling in the same spot again and again and testing batsmen’s patience. Now that Ashwin isn’t around, you can’t expect him to bowl like him. He is a great with over 500 Test wickets. Washington has to bowl like Washington…” Sundar pauses before completing the sentence: “And bat like Washington.”
What-a-TON Sundar! 💯
Grit. Determination. Dominance. Held the fort till the very end, a maiden test century to cherish forever! 🙌🏻#ENGvIND 👉 5th TEST | Starts THU, 31st July, 2:30 PM | Streaming on JioHotstar! pic.twitter.com/RGTICtTz53
— Star Sports (@StarSportsIndia) July 27, 2025
In India’s ongoing tour of England, Washington has shown with the ball and bat why he would be an integral member of the national team squad going forward. At Edgbaston and Lord’s, he has shown his off-breaks don’t need favourable conditions and that he has enough guile to create opportunities. And on the final day at Manchester, his unbeaten 206-ball 101 showed why he deserves to bat up the order. With a strong defence as his base, he is capable of constructing innings like any other top-order batsman and that’s one of the reasons why many in Tamil Nadu cricket have been harping, for long, that Washington’s batting capabilities are being under-utilised.
That may no longer be the case as Washington is emerging into a cricketer that Sundar has been dreaming of all along. “I wanted him to be the captain’s go-to man across formats with bat and ball. When you are switching formats, I didn’t want anything to be compromised. If your foundations are strong, you can manage everywhere. I have given Washy a strong base,” Sundar says.
For decades, Kamal Haasan has been the lone, bright shining star in Chennai’s Eldams Road. Now, with the 25-year-old all-rounder’s breakthrough performances in England, he has Washington for company.
Subtle refinements
The traits that Sundar spells out are what caught Stephen Fleming and MS Dhoni’s attention in the 2017 IPL. In 2025, it is why India are counting on Washington every time they pick him in the XI, knowing he won’t give away easy runs and can make telling contributions with the bat. It is precisely what Washington has delivered through the series, where he has left so much of a mark with the ball that Shubman Gill’s captaincy came under sharp scrutiny for not bowling him till the 69th over of England’s innings at Manchester. He may not be a conventional off-spinner, but the drift alone has caused England batsmen plenty of trouble.
“Very early in his age, all that I would make him bowl was spot bowling. I would drop a handkerchief on the pitch just outside the off-stump line. Washington’s job was to keep landing the ball repeatedly on it and hit the top of off-stump. With that line and the drift he was getting, I believed, he had more chances to succeed because he would constantly be bowling in the line of the stumps and even if it holds its line, then the outside edge will come in play. As a spinner, he can still test both the edges. And when he was also deceiving batsmen with his drift,” Sundar says.
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Everything that the English and Indian cricketers had done showcased a perfect response to the perennial question asked of Test cricket: Why play a game that goes on for five days – 35 hours, sometimes more – and yet produces no result? (AP Photo/Jon Super)
Being tall, Washington’s high-arm release and open-chested action mean he has the sight of batsmen at all times, allowing him to make adjustments till the point of release. Those huge fingers, impart plenty of revs, which in turn enable him to get the drift. That has become the sucker punch for batsmen.
“He has always had the drift,” AC Pratheepan, who has been mentoring him of late in Chennai, says. “In the last few years, he has undergone a small tweak, where he wants to use the crease and angles more to create the illusion in the minds of batsmen that he is getting more turn than what is actually on offer.”
#WashingtonSundar reflects on how special it was to score his maiden Test century to help save the match and how he and #Ravindrajadeja planned the rescue act together.#ENGvIND 👉 5th TEST | Starts THU, 31st July, 2:30 PM | Streaming on JioHotstar! pic.twitter.com/gKpcZHNIjX
— Star Sports (@StarSportsIndia) July 27, 2025
If that drift left both New Zealand’s Tom Latham and Rachin Ravindra squared up, in Manchester, it left Harry Brook in a different postcode. In all of it, apart from the drift, the angle causes an element of illusion.
Pratheepan points out how Washington has slightly changed his grip on the ball, which enables him to impart more revs than before. “Actually we’d been working on these things for way too long. Unfortunately, he went through a lot of injuries in between, which delayed it a bit. But once he got fully fit, his bowling has just evolved. It might seem like he isn’t doing much, but in terms of angles, speed and trajectory, he bowls a lot of variations that will make him effective across conditions,” Pratheepan, who also mentors Varun Chakaravarthy, adds.
Stop-start comeback
In January 2021, when Washington left Brisbane, he had put his imprint on a famous Test series win. He would later name his pet dog ‘Gabba’ and was full of hope. In the next two months, he would play three more Tests against England and had scores of 85*, 0, 0, 96*; only to be never picked again till the beginning of 2024. As India moved on from the Virat Kohli-Ravi Shastri era, it appeared they were doing so without Washington as well, going two entire World Test Championship cycles without considering him.
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Injuries (Two in his fingers and one in his shoulder and hamstring) also played their part, as every time he made a comeback, a lay-off seemed around the corner. Washington would change his diet plans, would go about improving his fitness, yet something seemed to hold him back.
India’s Washington Sundar celebrates after scoring a century on the final day of the fourth cricket test match between England and India at Emirates Old Trafford, Manchester, England, July 27, 2025.(AP Photo/Jon Super)
“It was definitely not an easy period,” his father Sundar says. “It was difficult to see him because he looked stressed and down. Personally, I’ve never seen him like this and at home, we, as a family, tried everything to keep in a good frame of mind. Growing up, because of cricket, he has missed out on a lot of things that other kids get to experience. And since he always calls me a hard taskmaster (Sundar was Washington’s first coach as well), at the ground, he was always fear-stricken when he saw me at home.”
During his stint as mentor of Lucknow Super Giants, Gautam Gambhir had told assistant coach Sridharan Sriram how Washington was being under-utilised in Indian ranks. Now in the hot seat as India head coach, at his first sight of distress during the New Zealand series, it was Washington that Gambhir turned to. When many expected Kuldeep Yadav to feature in the series – similar to the current circumstance in England – it was Washington who came in after a solid spell in the Ranji Trophy and got a spot in the XI.
Washington’s batting, despite his heroic efforts at Brisbane, Chennai and Ahmedabad, has gone under the radar. In Chennai cricket circles, many, including the reputed WV Raman, have always seen him as a top-order batsman who can bowl rather than a bowler who can also bat. In Washington’s formative years, Sundar had ensured his son got equal attention to both facets of the game. The mornings would see him alternate every day between bowling and batting before it was fine-tuned at the MRF Pace Foundation.
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“When Sundar brought him, even as a 14-year-old he could face fast bowlers bowling with a full run-up. He wasn’t afraid of facing them,” M Senthilnathan, who coaches him at club level, says. “Even when he came here, he had a strong defence. When your defence is strong, you can add shots to your batting. He doesn’t need to change his game based on the format. He has shots that go all around the park. If he constantly gets to bat higher up, you will see more from him as a batsman. With confidence, he would only get better,” he says.
