India, July 30 -- Ajinkya Rahane can evoke a range of emotions among Indian cricket fans. The young generation, brought up on an overdose of white-ball cricket, would have liked him to take on the spinners head-on rather than hang on the back foot. Some others felt he was too indecisive at times. And for the Mumbai fraternity, he was not assertive enough to deal with dressing room politics. But ask his opponents and a different view of Rahane emerges - a tough, hard-nosed character who thrived under pressure.

On Thursday, three years after playing his last Test for India, the middle-order batter from Mumbai announced his international retirement, finishing with 5077 runs in 85 matches. For some cricketers, numbers don't tell the full sto...