cricket of yesteryear

[S.Balaji]

[Quote :
Could you please recollect the commentators and your views on them? I think it may have been Vijay Merchant, Raju Bharatan, Suresh Saraiya to name just 2, since I have seen photos of Raju and Vijay Saab in the commentary box. BTW, was Raju's narration similar to his writing style? Although some of my friends came close to be admitted in Kilpauk Mental Hospital after reading couple of Raju's articles , I am a big fan of Raju and have a file with some 110 articles by him

Response :
Raju used to write in Illustrated Weekly - I wonder whether this magazine exists now ?? All black and white photos and he was number one Cricket journalist those days.
Suresh Saraiya's voice was very nice and soft and I have heard his voice on Radio along with SUnil Chaturvedi.
By the way , I must mention our good old RAMAMURTHY - well known for his tamil commentary !! When I mentioned Ramamurthy, I must add Koothabiraan also !!! ( Have you heard about him ? He is called vanolee anna !! )
I am not sure Vijay Merchant did commentary .
There was also another commentator - Anand Rao - He used to start the day with :

GOOD MORNING GENTLEMAN , THIS IS ANAND RAO SPEAKING FROM THE PAVILION END . TODAY IS A BRIGHT SUNNY MORNING WITH CLEAR BLUE SKIES !!! ETC ETC.

Coming back to the topic of CHennai test - as I mentioned earlier, Alwvn Kalcharan was going well and but for the controversial run out from Ashok Mankad ( can you pls check with somebody whether the throw came from deep square leg or fine leg ?? ) . It was a direct throw and the umpire got so thrilled that he gave out.

From what I heard, it was from deep point with one stump visible and kalli decide to run since it went to Mankad, usually a horrible fielder.

Response :
Could be but it was a direct throw and the umpire got thrilled probably and gave him run out in excitement.

Jabbar, as i had mentioned was a nice teamman and played well for SBI. It was Jabbar , Prabakar , Kedarnath ( we call him as Kedari ) , Raghavan ( very senior man - spinner ) , Babul nath , C.S.Suresh Kumar ( played one test ), Barath Reddy - wonderful characters from SBI.
By the way, is HIndu trophy being played now ??

Yes it is still being played. My favorite memory of Jabbar is the 84-85 Duleep Trophy final when he played a match winning 77 to take South to victory over North. I think you are confusing C Suresh with TE Srinivasan. C Suresh made his Ranji debut in 82-83 season only and topped with 481 runs. TE was a vaal-player with a big mouth. Once he sledged Rodney Hogg in the 1979-80 Aussie visit and got bouncers in return. Umpire Gothoskar warned him not to risk his life irritating a pacer like Hogg!

Response :
Repeat, it was C.S.Suresh Kumar only who played a test . This Suresh Kumar was senior to me in Vivekananda college by 2 years and we had played intra college tournament in Viveka in 1983 and I have spoken to him a couple of times. We did B.Com in Viveka.
Suresh kumar also played for SBI later.

About TE , I must give a separate posting as I need to write a lot about him!!


[/quote]
Simmo is my pick for the brainiest cricketer of the century - he is an amazing cricket brain, whether has cricketer or coach. Coming 9 yrs after retirement and hitting 500+ runs vs the Big Three spinners is incredible. Thommo IMHO is another brainless guy like Shoaib Akhtar.

Response :
Thommo lost his pace as he and probably Redpath dashed each other's shoulders while going for a catch and after that he never reovered fully. THommo's best series was - 1975-76 when WI toured Aussies and for Aussie Greg Chappel was the captain. It was 5-1 white wash ( I will write a full posting on this series as well )

[quote )
Could be right. Not sure but Doshi was already aged at that time[/quote]
Age shouldnt be held against Doshi since all spinners mature late. Besides Doshi made his debut in early '79 and was pushed out in early '81 so keeping him for 2 years doesnt make sense. His last game was the Bangalore Test v Pak in 83-84.

Agreed . Doshi was a relative failure in the series when England toured India and in one particular test in Chennai wherein Vishy and yashpal scored double centuries , we expected a lot from him but he failed in that test ( incidentally we saw that day in Chepauk - full house and not even a single wicket fell that day !!! )

G.A.Pratap Kumar( we call him GAP ), P.C. Naresh, K. Srinath ( Srikanth's brother and better player than Srikanth !! ) Ram Prakash, C.S.Suresh Kumar, Babul Nath, T.A.Sekar, Bharat Reddy etc etc.

GAP played for AP. TAS was unlucky that on the 82-83 tour of Pak, some shoddy slipfielding spoilt his figures. He was faster than Kapil then.

Response
You are right. GAP played for Andhra while representing SBI . Yes TA was unlucky as he also got the break very late in his career. I think it was 28 years or something . Not sure. I have seen his pace in Universityunion once.

Sadagopan Ramesh is really unlucky as he played well against Pak and Srilanka. I think he got injured in that terrible series in Ausie - 2000 under Sachin and never could come back except that he scored some runs in Chennai test against Ausie

Well, compared to Gambhir, Ramesh is inferior. Gambhir is a heavy scorer on the domestic circuit compared to Ramesh and will always be my first choice. Ramesh is more or less in Wasim Jaffer level. He had a great opportunity to play a match winning innings in 2003 Ranji final but flopped.

Response:
Ramesh is a flasy player . Not technically sound to defend bowlers like McGrath or Gillespie but had a decent average.

Arun Lal - a very mediocre cricketer , not a great batsman , he had his limitations, not a stroke player- but now making money in TV !!

Not really! Arun had very good scores whenever given a chance. I cant believe he was dropped in 1986-87 for Srikkanth after scoring 52 and 70 in the only Test he got. He was the best opener we got in the post-Sunny era.
Regarding commentary, Arun and Kirti Azad are the best Indian comms, compared to other crappy speakers(jokers?) like Maninder, Wassan, Mohinder, Yashpal

Response :
I still doubt Arun Lal's capabilities as he was not a great stroke maker. Very vey dull and defensive player. We also had the misfortune of seeing players like - Pranoy roy !!! ( son of Pankaj Roy ).
Your analysis of commentary is nice . WIsh to add only one sentence - Maninder .... to Yashpal - all are Hindi variety and little you can expect from them . Dont compare Delhi with Mumbai !!!
Ravi is exceptional and he is out of SMGs school of cricket !!!.Sanjay manjrekar is following now

Carlton - Nice player - played for Blr but faded away as SUnny was experimenting with guys like - GHULAM PARKAR !!!

Correction, Ghulam never got to play a Test after 81-82. He got just a ODI v Windies at Guwahati where he was Man of the Match. But due to age, he wasnt considered. I am okay with guys like him given a chance, considering the fact that Srikkanth got 43 chances to play tests

Response :

Not sure. WIll revert.

By lunch sunny touched 60 !! It was an achievement considering his style of batting.

Nice memory there!! I still recollect the 12:40 maanila seidhigal which mentioned SMG's score as 60. The day was October 29 1983 and I recollect the Sportstar cover which had the caption "29th century on the 29th of the month"

Response :
I am a mad fan of SMG and thank you very much for your excellent recollection of that innings. It will last in my memory forever like anyother fan of SMG. After he scored the century , both Viv and Clive ran all the way and shook hands with Sunny as it was a special occasion - He equalled Sir Don's record !

THere was one close call after that when Holding had him trapped right in front but the umpire saved SUnny.

Sunny was dropped on 28 by Dujon off a mishook

Response:
Yes,initially Jeff missed that hook of SMG and he was lucky but Holding trapped him right in front !!

Sad , amarnath who did extremely well in WI and the world cup was scoring telephone numbers !!!! 2 1 0 2 1 etc etc

Actually Jimmy had terrible sickness at that time. But since he scored 1000 runs before May earlier, selectors forced him to play 3 Tests. The sequence of 0,0,1,0,0,0 was shocking. But he bounced back in the 83-84 Pak tour with a match saving 101* at Lahore.

Response :
Jimmy is one of those technically sound players matched only by SMG. Jimmy also played a wonderful inning in Ranji final vs Karnataka . He was not out until end . It was a big score to chase and finally there was a guy by name Rajesh Peter who slaughtered Karnataka attack and crossed their total. That innings of Jimmy is still in my memory.

I was based in Mumbai for 9 long years

Interestingly I was also there for a few years. I went to the last day of the 2002 Test v Windies hoping for a Lara century. But alas, it all ended in 3 hours with Harbhajan's 7-48. Seeing the spineless display, it couldnt believe it was the same country for whom Clive Lloyd had smashed 242 and 37 on that very ground 28 yrs ago
Since none else is participating, I think it will be better to take this offline over email. I am sending a pm. I have come to know dozens of people over net who actually lived within a kilometer from my house, possibly you were my neighbor in Bombay!!!

Response :
I have been living in Kandivli east - Lokhandwala township - Whispering palms !!. Where were you in Mumbai ??
I was also in Mulund East and Thane west for some time.

Quote :
(Aside: As far as spin goes, I feel Gupte is the best of all! He had a home avg of 30 and away avg of 28 which is great considering that he played a few away series that India lost 5-0. He only played against Eng, WI, Pak and Aus. If he had played NZ, I am sure he would have destroyed them(Even Venkat had 44w off 10 Tests v NZ). Gupte was bowling to top batsmen of the calibre of Weekes/Walcott/Worrell/Hunte/Sobers/Kanhai/Harvey/May/Barrington/Cowdrey/Dexter/Hanif, each of whom are all time greats)[/quote]

Response :
As I said earlier, my era starts from 1970 and I will check with my cousins and revert

Bye for now

[hehehewalrus]

Suresh Saraiya's voice was very nice and soft and I have heard his voice on Radio along with SUnil Chaturvedi.
By the way , I must mention our good old RAMAMURTHY - well known for his tamil commentary !! When I mentioned Ramamurthy, I must add Koothabiraan also !!! ( Have you heard about him ? He is called vanolee anna !! )

Aha, thanks for reminding about Koothabiran. I remember Ramamoorthy, Jabbar, Manivannan. Also CR Rangachari used to drop in regularly as the expert. He would unfailingly mention clean bowling Don Bradman in the 47-48 series.

I also remember the SriLankan tamil commentators - One out of 2 srilankans would invariably be a Fernando! In 1984-85 SLBC covered the SL-Pak series. I was in primary school and one day we were having a class test on some "seyyul/thelivurai". Not knowing it properly, I wrote "Asantha De Mel meendum Pavilion munai-yilirindhu varugiraar....." and other crap in the test notebook. My equally clueless deskmate copied it word by word. Mercifully we didnt submit it

Once while shopping on Flora Fountain, I found some 2nd hand cricket books with Saraiya's name and address on it.

You should watch Holding's bowling in the 76 series in England when he took 14 wickets on a flat surface !!.

Thanks. Here is one of them - the wicket of Balderstone who was making his debut.
http://3lib.ukonline.co.uk/cricket/holding1.mpg

Tony Greig bowled - I think Tony hit a century here
http://3lib.ukonline.co.uk/cricket/holding2.mpg

Repeat, it was C.S.Suresh Kumar only who played a test .

No, Suresh debuted only in 82-83. He didnt even make it to South Zone team. After a successful 82-83 he faded out. No chance of CS playing tests.

Thommo lost his pace as he and probably Redpath dashed each other's shoulders while going for a catch and after that he never reovered fully. THommo's best series was - 1975-76 when WI toured Aussies and for Aussie Greg Chappel was the captain. It was 5-1 white wash ( I will write a full posting on this series as well )

I think you are referring to Alan Turner, not Redpath. Redpath played a great innings in 1969-70 series v India.

Also Thommo was great in the 1974-75 Ashes series which Aus won 4-1 demolishing Amiss completely. Amiss had scored heavily v WI in 1973-74

There was one test v WI in 77-78 where Aus was Packerized. The Windies bounced them in Barbados and a furious Thommo bounced them out in return. It was a torrid spell of bowling - Thommo 6 for 78 in 13 overs!

Agreed . Doshi was a relative failure in the series when England toured India and in one particular test in Chennai wherein Vishy and yashpal scored double centuries , we expected a lot from him but he failed in that test

Nope!!! To be fair to Doshi, it was a BORING series full of BATATHONS. Doshi topped the bowling averages by a tremendous margin:
DR Doshi 267.5 103 468 22 21.27 5-39 1 - 1.75
S Madan Lal 159 34 432 14 30.85 5-23 2 - 2.72
N Kapil Dev 243.1 40 835 22 37.95 6-91 2 - 3.43

Do you recollect Gooch's assault on Kapil at Chepauk in this series?

I am a mad fan of SMG and thank you very much for your excellent recollection of that innings. It will last in my memory forever like anyother fan of SMG.

Nice to know that. I think we can talk about more stuff on Sunny's great knocks if you want.

1) 166* v Pak at Chennai
2) 221 at Oval in that cheated draw
3) 103 v NZ world cup 87
4) Explosive 74 v SL at Nagpur 86-87
5) Masterly 172 v Aus Sydney
6) Farewell innings 188 v MCC at Lords 1987

Response :
Jimmy is one of those technically sound players matched only by SMG. Jimmy also played a wonderful inning in Ranji final vs Karnataka . He was not out until end . It was a big score to chase and finally there was a guy by name Rajesh Peter who slaughtered Karnataka attack and crossed their total. That innings of Jimmy is still in my memory.

Oh yes, the 1981-82 final. Rajesh Peter and Rajesh Shukla took them to victory chasing 706 for a win. The tables were turned on Delhi in the Irani Trophy though - A breaktaking innings by Srikkanth(110 off 67 balls) and Malhotra as ROI chased 424 in 4th innings. Rajesh Peter collided with Madan Lal and was carried off the field.

Do you remember the 1987-88 Ranji final and 1988 Irani Final where VB Chandra dazzled?

Jimmy is a legend. In 83-84 Barbados test Jimmy was hit on the mouth and there was blood on the pitch and his shirt. He calmly washed the blood from his shirt at lunch in order to show the Windies he wasnt intimidated and proceeded to bat. The 91 and 80 he scored are legendary.

[S.Balaji]

Dear Walrus,

Before I can reply to your other points in your earlier posting,

I will complete your query on Gooch's innings in Chennai test .

The Indian first innings went almost up to Lunch time and Vishy was extending his innings along with Yashpal. I think he came very close to SMGs record of 221 ( in oval ) and we ( we used to have SMG vs Vishy during those days !! ) we were worried and concerned whether Vishy will overtake that milestone of SMG as we will have to face the wrath of our friends who are VIshy fans !! Finally when he scored 222 , we were so upset that we all SMG fans moved out of the scene and disappeared for that entire day !!
Incidentally SMG was the captain in that series .

Now England was left to avoid followon and had a huge target to counter.

Enter Gooch with his High back lift like S.V.Ranga rao in Maya Bazaarr !!

I will never forget that knock of Gooch as he tore Kapil and Madan lal to smitherins .

Boundaries were flowing from his bat every over and at one stage I remember Gooch just caressing the bat casually after hitting a cover drive for four.

We were so silly that evening that we started celebrating that Knock and started abusing our VIshy fans that Gooch had overshadowed Vishy !!!

That match went to become a dull draw . We all fet sad that Doshi was the strike bowler along with Kapil but could not exploit the 3rd day pitch . Ofcourse, I also vaguely recollect Ian Botham using his pads to all deliveries of Doshi who had no clue on how to tackle this approach of BOtham.

End

[S.Balaji]

Dear Walrus,

I think the Irani trophy final where Sri and Ashok Malhotra played well - Ashok got selected for the test series also following that and we were closely listening on Radio, that match.

Ashok Malhotra was more of a GRV copy but faded away soon.

He was given enough chances.

VB Chandra played well in that final and got selected to play for NZ I think . VB used to play without helmet and all.

VB was a very good cricketer, very aggressive batsman

[S.Balaji]

In fact I had played against VB also earlier in St. Bede's Ground Mylapore and he scored heavily. We lost by a huge margin. It was a local tournament and we were ejected

[hehehewalrus]

The SMG innings of 96 at Bangalore also coincided with the India-Argentina Davis Cup pre-quarter final. While SMG's knock ended in tragedy, another legend(Ok ok Vijay was nothing internationally, but for an Indian to go that far was something great) covered himself with glory. Yes its the great victory over Martin Jaite I am talking about.

But more on that later. My proudest moment in sport(which is very rare since I dont recall watching any sport where I wanted a particular team to win whether it's india or any other team) was the Davis Cup semifinal of 1987 - India vs Australia Sydney 1987.

September 30 1987, The inaguration of Reliance World Cup by Rajeev Gandhi took place. All the captains were introduced to him followed by a match between India and Pak. We got up next morning and I was surprised to see India winning that game. The same day evening we heard on the news that Wimbledon Champion Pat Cash had pulled out of the semifinal due to injury. This was a dampener as Cash had heroically beaten Pernfors and Edberg in the previous year's Davis Cup final.

Next morning, Ramesh took on John Fitzgerald and won in 4 sets I think. Now Vijay took on Wally Masur. Masur had gunned Becker in the 1987 Australian Open and was in peak form. Vijay played brilliantly and India got a 2-0 lead.

The next day Vijay pulled out of the Doubles as Pat Cash teamed up with Peter Doohan, the same Doohan who gave Becker his first defeat in Wimbledon in 4 years(1984: 16 year old Boris fell down on court against Bill Scanlon in Round Three and got carried off, 1985: Won, 1986: Won, 1987: 18 match unbeaten streak broken)

Vasudevan paired with Anand and they were no match for Cash and Doohan. It was easy to see how Doohan beat Becker! Last game, Doohan fired 3 aces down the middle in a row to win the match.

Final day morning, Vijay lost to Fitzgerald and pressure was back on Ramesh to repeat his deciding final match like against Argentina. Masur went up 4-1 in each of the first two sets but Ramesh fought back and clinched the two sets. I think the score was 8-6 8-6 6-4.

We were able to see only one half of the match as it was sunday morning. I think there was a bulletin over the Radio by 10 AM IST which announced India's triumphant entry to the final. Ramesh's wife Priya was present, I am not sure if Ramanathan Krishnan had come to Sydney. Just that time, his sister Radhika Krishnan had retired after winning the women's nationals, so hope Nandita Krishnan who is now playing juniors keeps up the family tradition started by her great-grandfather TK Ramanathan. (Do the family still live in their Oliver Road residence in Chennai?)

The best part is that with a team like Vijay, Ramesh, Vasu and Anand, it was basically Tamil Nadu beating Defending Champions Australia 3-2 in Australia!!

[hehehewalrus]

Enter Gooch with his High back lift like S.V.Ranga rao in Maya Bazaarr !!

But alas, it was not high backlift but his sweeps which drowned india in 87 world cup semifinal.

Eng 254, India 219 in 45.2 overs - The remaining 28 balls tells the story of self inflicted pressure

[Thiru]

Enter Gooch with his High back lift like S.V.Ranga rao in Maya Bazaarr !!

:lol2: :lol2: :lol2: :lol2:

But alas, it was not high backlift but his sweeps which drowned india in 87 world cup semifinal.

Eng 254, India 219 in 45.2 overs - The remaining 28 balls tells the story of self inflicted pressure :(

not to forget the matured captain kapil getting tempted by a 70-year old eddie hemmings offering to hold out to deep mid wicket...

[hehehewalrus]

not to forget the matured captain kapil getting tempted by a 70-year old eddie hemmings offering to hold out to deep mid wicket...

Thiruji,
It was not that horrible an event. Actually, Hemmings was the only Hittable bowler in the English team. The rest were maintaining a very tight line. Hemmings and Gooch sharing 10 overs represented the weak link. All others were giving in the 35-45 run range.

The tactic worked well for a long time. Hemmings was going at over 6 an over and wicketless too despite the turning pitch. Kapil chanced his arm and raced to 30 off 24 balls with Azhar looking very dangerous at the other end. Everyone scored at run a ball and with 15 overs left, India were firm favorites with 6 wickets left. Kapil's early onslaught contributed to it. There was tremendous pressure on India as the crowd might riot. Some they regularly kept the run rate at 5 but the tail played some poor shots.

Kapil's hitting was only part of the tactic. The tail was swept away without any resistance.

[S.Balaji]

[quote="hehehewalrus"]The SMG innings of 96 at Bangalore also coincided with the India-Argentina Davis Cup pre-quarter final. While SMG's knock ended in tragedy, another legend(Ok ok Vijay was nothing internationally, but for an Indian to go that far was something great) covered himself with glory. Yes its the great victory over Martin Jaite I am talking about.

Hello Walrus,

It was a sad end to a great inning from SMG in Blr and I recollect SMG walking very slowly out to the pavilion. He felt that the catch went off his pads and was given out . We lost the match by 16 runs I think.
However we had our proud moment to celebrate as IMMEDIATELY we started comparing that knock with Vishy's 97 NO in Chennai !!!

I cannot forget that great show of VIjay and Ramesh in Aus - Davis Cup. I have been following tennis since 1979 ( i mean Byon Borg Vs Mcenroe days ).
I had to write a big thread about Tennis as I have seen both the finals of 79 and 80 - first one was Borg's 5th WImbledon title and and the second one was won by Mc. The first final went to 5 sets and in the 5th set , Borg showed his experience and won the title.

Coming back to Indian's best tennis in Aussie, Perter Doohan was a moody player , never consistent.
Before he beat Becker, Becker was called - BOOM BOOM BECKER , THE LENDL RECKER !!
After Doohan beat him , the news item next day read - DOOHAN, THE BECKER RECKER !!!
Waly Masur was a nice player. Vijay probably played his best tennis of his life in that match.

Pat Cash - I remember after beating Lendl in the Wimbledon final , he ran up to the guest box and hugged his father and fiancee I think. Others followed that style subsequently !!!

My all time favourite is - MAGNIFICIENT PISTOL PETE SAMPRAS !!!

Oops, are we deviating from Cricket ??