Most Successful Captain in India in ODI, Test, and T20

Indian team has produced some of the most amazing minds in cricket—cricketers who understand the basics and technicalities of the game. Successful captains in India are a combination of aggression, coolness, and game awareness. Kapil Dev and MS Dhoni are known as the coolest captain in India because they analyze the game very deeply; after that, they ask players to execute. This is the main reason for their success; they never allow their opponent to guess their next move.
On the other hand, captains from a new generation, like Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli, are known for their aggressive behavior toward opponents. They try to suppress the opponent by attacking them with the bat and behavior. Cricket pandits admire this behavior due to fast cricket.
Captains are trying to convince their players to score runs at a quick strike rate; at the same time, bowers try to get wickets as early as possible. So this approach is widely used by modern Indian captains introduced that.
Let’s analyze the most successful Indin Captains:

Most Succesful Indian Captain by Wins

MS Dhoni – 178 Wins

The most successful Indian captain across all formats is MS Dhoni. He is the only skipper from India with ICC T20 WC, ICC ODI WC, and ICC champions trophy.
The Indian team was experiencing difficulties replacing Sourav Ganguly as captain after his departure. During this time, they tried using Virender Sehwag, Rahul Dravid, and Anil Kumble, but each of them struggled to be their team captain. All of these failures paved the way for India’s best cricket captain.

MS Dhoni is the pioneer of the new era of Indian cricket. Indian cricket achieves its peak popularity and performance during his reign. He provides some brilliant batters to India, Like Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Shikhar Dhawan, and many others.

MS Dhoni captained the Indian side in 332 games across all formats, winning 54% of the time. He gives his hundred percent to the game not only with leadership skills but also with the bat. He scored 11207 runs across all formats in those 332 games as captain. It is quite difficult for any batter coming at the lower middle order, but everyone is surprised by Dhoni’s batting performance.

Read More: Most Succesful captain in T20I

Virat Kohli – 135 Wins

Virat Kohli is the second-best captain of the Indian cricket team. He won 135 out of 213 games for India. At the same time, he became the third-highest runs scorer as captain in the world.

He captained Indian Teams in four ICC tournaments. India reached the final in the ICC champions trophy but lost against Pakistan by 180 runs. In World Test Championship, New Zealand won the final eight wickets; similarly, in the ICC ODI world cup, India qualified for the semi-final. But you cannot underestimate his services as captain through these performances.
Although he could not win any major tournaments, his bilateral series performances are exceptional. He won 38 series out of 69 he led the Indian team.
During his captaincy, the Indian team reaches the top spot in Test, ODI, and T20 ICC Rankings. Virat Kohli became the number one Indian captain by winning most test matches.

Mohammad Azharuddin – 104 Wins

Azharrudin led Indian teams from 1990 to 1999 in 221 games and won 104 games with a winning percentage of 47. Although he has the third-highest wins for India as captain, other stats are not promising.

Seven different captains lead Indian Team in the ICC world cup from 1975 to 2019. Muhammad Azharudin is the only captain who led Indian Team in three different world cups in 1992, 1996, and 1999.
In 1992 India ended their world cup journey in seventh position as this world cup was played with round robin stage plan.
In 1996 they qualifies for the semis and faced a shameful defeat against Sri Lanka.
In 1999 top six teams played at the super six stages, where India won only one game.
But the main reason behind this long captaincy tenure was his batting. He was the leading runs scorer as captain at that time and eventually broke by MS Dhoni.

Sourav Ganguly –  97 Wins

Sourav Ganguly has the 4th highest wins for India. He won 97 out of 195 matches as captain. He was appointed as captain after the failure of Azharudin on multiple occasions.
The Indian team lost their confidence after departures in the early stages of the last world cup. Ganguly tried to heal this damage that eventually kept alive the passion of fans for Cricket.

As soon as he took charge as captain Indian team started winning matches again, and they succeeded in drawing the Border-Gavaskar trophy in Australia. Then beat Pakistan on their home soil in the Test and ODI series.
The team that was struggling to qualify for the super six and quarter-final played the final of the Cricket World Cup in 2003.
He has one of the most solid minds with a cricketing sense as he started revamping the Indian team during his captaincy and succeeded to some extent. Similarly, he introduces some changes in the BCCI constitution for the betterment of Indian Cricket.

Rohit Sharma – 62 Wins

Rohit Sharma is the most successful Indian captain by winning percentage. He led started leading the Indian Team on different occasions but took charge as permanent captain in 2022 after the defeat of the Indian Team in the T20 WC 2022.

Rohit is known for his aggressive approach as captain. He uses this technique in every format and gets success. He won 4 out of five test matches, 39 out of 51 T20I, and 29 out of 24 matches.
India lost only one bilateral series in ODI and T20I and zero test series under Rohit Sharma’s captaincy.

Rahul Dravid – 50 Wins

Rahul Dravid led the Indian Team from 2000 to 2007. His captaincy tenure is seven years long, but he became permanent captain of the Indian Team in 2005 after Sourav Ganguly.

Fans have many reasons to remember his captaincy, but the Test series win in 2004, and the ODI series in 2006 against Pakistan in Pakistan is worth remembering. Because Pakistan was one of the toughest sides at that time, their bowling and batting sides were equally brutal.

Read More: Rahul Dravid captaincy stats

Kapil Dev – 43 Wins

Indian cricket fans will always be indebted to Kapil Dev for his services as captain of the Indian Team. He is one of the main reasons behind the mad following of cricket. Before his arrival, the Indian Team was playing decent cricket, but the victory in the 1983 world cup changed everything.

India became the first Team to win the ODI world cup after West Indies; even Australia waited four more years to achieve this title.
Kapil Dev won 43 games in total out of 74. Most of his wins are ODI matches, where he won 39 matches. He might have the highest draw ratio in Test matches because 22 out of 34 matches ended without any result.

Most Successful Captain in India in Test

Most Successful Indian Captain in ODI

Most Successful Indian Captain in T20I