For a fleeting moment, Ravichandran Ashwin had a wry smile on his face, he has matured enough to learn to keep away the disappointments and focus on the positives in life.

But the memories of the last World Test Championship (WTC) final at The Oval or not playing any of the Tests in the 2021-22 series in England will linger. The wily off-spinner could always have increased his tally of 153 wickets overseas had the team management not decided to keep him out of the XI.

This, when he was included in the XI for the inaugural WTC final (2021) in the blustery conditions of Southampton and ended up with figures of 4/45 in the match.

Speaking to the media ahead of what would be his 100th Test match, Ashwin did not hide his disappointment at being sidelined from the WTC final last year, but tried to explain the think-tank’s decision to persist with Ravindra Jadeja.

Back home he doesn’t have to deal with such worries even in freezing conditions as slow turners on dry surfaces are tailor-made for spinners of his ilk. Even the Dharamsala pitch is dry and devoid of grass, which suggests it will turn as the match progresses.

“The only way you can find an answer for that is if you had a time machine, me playing, and then whether the result would’ve been different,” Ashwin said on Tuesday.

“It’s always disappointing not to play a particular game for your country. When you know you’re bowling well and all that. Again, I would definitely make peace with it, saying the team definitely took the decision in the best interest of the team.

“I don’t think any captain or any coach really wants to leave out a player who is really of use in that particular game. The person who is taking my place is Ravindra Jadeja. He’s been batting pretty well, as you see (from) his averages with the bat. I think that’s where he outscored me in those games... Yeah, so I’d say I’d make peace with that.”

For someone who always puts team achievements ahead of individual achievements, Ashwin didn’t single out any five-fors in his list of best spells.

“When you finish, it is Test wins that stand really tall,” Ashwin said.

“But having given it a lot of thought, one of the finest spells I have bowled has to be the one in Birmingham in 2018. I got three wickets on the morning of Day III. I got Cook, Root and Jennings. I got seven wickets in the game. I felt like I had almost bowled India to victory in the game, but it didn’t happen. That has to be one of the finest spells I have bowled.”

The other two are 4/113 at Centurion earlier that year, when he led South Africa’s collapse for 335 — “It could have been six or seven but it didn’t happen,” he said —, and his 2/84 in the first innings against Australia in Bangalore (2017) which fetched India a famous victory. He also had a six-for in the fourth innings of the same Test.

As for his battles with batters, Ashwin picked Steve Smith and Joe Root among the best.

“I’ve loved bowling to Steven Smith, (Kane) Williamson and Joe Root,” he said. “They’re some of the finest.”

But he felt not having to bowl to S. Badrinath of Tamil Nadu and Delhi’s Rajat Bhatia and Mithun Manhas in international cricket saved him from a lot of blushes.

“These are still some of the greatest batters of spin that I would have completely not wanted to encounter in international cricket.”