Want to know how to play Spin bowling on a Square turner? Watch Sunny's last test innings.

For all those who are criticizing the Nagpur Pitch, all I have to say is to watch the video of the India vs Pakistan Test 1987, Bangalore, especially the 4th Innings.

 

The pitch was a square turner, worse than Nagpur. Pakistan batted first and scored 116. India replied with 145, only Vengsarkar scoring 50. Pakistan replied with 249 setting India a target of 221. Till then Spinners had a field day, and had taken 27 of the 30 wickets to fall. They will go on to take another 8 wickets in the final innings. Pak spinners Iqbal Qasim and Tauseef Ahmed were turning the ball square. But they had to content with one man, playing the last innings of his illustrious career. I had the fortune to watch it on the hostel common room TV.

 

Sunil Gavaskar, the greatest batsman (in my opinion) India has seen walked out intent to win the match single handedly. The devils of the pitch did not matter. Not a single ball beat him and he played 320 balls and all the others put together 342 balls. He scored 96 priceless runs. He was right forward, or right back. He left the ball spotlessly. He played with Soft hands. He punished the loose balls. It was a chanceless innings.

 

The legendary Imran Khan put Rizwan uz Zaman and Mansoor Elahi, two young batsmen on Silly point and Silly mid on. One of them asked "Skipper where can we expect a catch?". Imran replied "Oh Don't bother, you are not going to get even the semblance of a catch. I put you there so that you can just watch from close up how to play spin bowling. You wont get another chance"

 

He brought India tantalizingly close to victory. As I said it was a chanceless innings. And it was in reality as he was wrongly given out at 96, caught by Rizwan of Qasim, when the ball had gone off his forearm.

 

We were about 12 who were watching the innings. Some of them strong anti Gavaskar guys. But everyone had a tear when he got out. He got out when still 40 short, having scored 96  of the 180 till then. It was his greatest innings. He defied everything Qasim and Tauseef threw at him and blunted all the tactics of the wily Imran. It was his swansong, but what a song! He never complained about being given out wrongly. A mild look of surprise and off he walked, just 4 short of a most deserving century.

 

If I were the South Africa coach, I would get a copy of that video and ask Amla, Du Plessis and even ABD to watch it for 3 days non stop so as to drill into them what and how it is to play spin on a vicious track. (what the heck! even Ravi Shastri, the current Indian Team Director, who was a part of that 1987 team, should play the video over and over again to the Indian Batsmen)

 

To put that innings in perspective, I give below the score card.

 

Pakistan in India Test Series - 5th Test

India v Pakistan

Pakistan won by 16 runs

Test no. 1073 | 1986/87 season

Played at M Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bangalore

13,14,15,17 March 1987 (5-day match)

	Pakistan 1st innings		R	M	B	4s	6s	SR
	Rameez Raja	c Vengsarkar b Kapil Dev	22	42	27	4	0	81.48
	Rizwan-uz-Zaman	b Kapil Dev	0	3	1	0	0	0.00
	Saleem Malik	b Maninder Singh	33	99	60	5	0	55.00
	Javed Miandad	c Shastri b Maninder Singh	7	49	32	1	0	21.87
	Manzoor Elahi	c Azharuddin b Maninder Singh	0	2	3	0	0	0.00
	Imran Khan*	c Amarnath b Maninder Singh	6	23	19	1	0	31.57
	Wasim Akram	b Maninder Singh	0	6	3	0	0	0.00
	Saleem Yousuf†	c & b Shastri	0	12	8	0	0	0.00
	Iqbal Qasim	b Maninder Singh	19	40	28	3	0	67.85
	Tauseef Ahmed	not out	15	89	72	0	0	20.83
	Saleem Jaffar	c Vengsarkar b Maninder Singh	8	53	50	0	0	16.00
	Extras	(b 2, lb 1, nb 3)	6
	Total	(all out; 49.2 overs)	116	(2.35 runs per over)

Fall of wickets 1-3 (Rizwan-uz-Zaman), 2-39 (Rameez Raja), 3-60 (Javed Miandad), 4-60 (Manzoor Elahi), 5-68 (Saleem Malik), 6-68 (Imran Khan), 7-73 (Wasim Akram), 8-74 (Saleem Yousuf), 9-98 (Iqbal Qasim), 10-116 (Saleem Jaffar)

	Bowling	O	M	R	W	Econ
	N Kapil Dev	11	2	23	2	2.09
	RMH Binny	3	0	25	0	8.33
	M Amarnath	3	1	7	0	2.33
	Maninder Singh	18.2	8	27	7	1.47
	RJ Shastri	11	1	19	1	1.72
	NS Yadav	3	0	12	0	4.00

	India 1st innings		R	M	B	4s	6s	SR
	SM Gavaskar	b Tauseef Ahmed	21	91	73	2	0	28.76
	K Srikkanth	b Tauseef Ahmed	21	44	29	4	0	72.41
	M Amarnath	b Tauseef Ahmed	13	87	78	1	0	16.66
	DB Vengsarkar	c Manzoor Elahi b Tauseef Ahmed	50	94	84	7	1	59.52
	M Azharuddin	c Manzoor Elahi b Iqbal Qasim	6	30	30	0	0	20.00
	RJ Shastri	c Saleem Malik b Tauseef Ahmed	7	28	15	1	0	46.66
	N Kapil Dev*	c Saleem Malik b Iqbal Qasim	9	20	18	2	0	50.00
	RMH Binny	c Tauseef Ahmed b Iqbal Qasim	1	23	29	0	0	3.44
	KS More†	not out	9	22	13	0	1	69.23
	NS Yadav	b Iqbal Qasim	0	7	6	0	0	0.00
	Maninder Singh	c †Saleem Yousuf b Iqbal Qasim	0	5	10	0	0	0.00
	Extras	(b 4, lb 4)	8
	Total	(all out; 64 overs)	145	(2.26 runs per over)

Fall of wickets 1-39 (Srikkanth), 2-56 (Gavaskar), 3-71 (Amarnath), 4-102 (Azharuddin), 5-126 (Shastri), 6-130 (Vengsarkar), 7-135 (Binny), 8-137 (Kapil Dev), 9-143 (Yadav), 10-145 (Maninder Singh)

	Bowling	O	M	R	W	Econ
	Imran Khan	5	0	26	0	5.20
	Wasim Akram	2	0	9	0	4.50
	Iqbal Qasim	30	15	48	5	1.60
	Tauseef Ahmed	27	7	54	5	2.00

	Pakistan 2nd innings		R	M	B	4s	6s	SR
	Rameez Raja	b Yadav	47	112	94	4	0	50.00
	Javed Miandad	c Srikkanth b Shastri	17	60	37	2	0	45.94
	Rizwan-uz-Zaman	b Shastri	1	13	9	0	0	11.11
	Saleem Malik	b Kapil Dev	33	74	62	4	0	53.22
	Iqbal Qasim	c Srikkanth b Yadav	26	69	47	3	0	55.31
	Imran Khan*	c Srikkanth b Shastri	39	129	100	3	0	39.00
	Manzoor Elahi	c †More b Maninder Singh	8	54	53	0	1	15.09
	Wasim Akram	lbw b Maninder Singh	11	14	12	1	1	91.66
	Saleem Yousuf†	not out	41	107	90	4	0	45.55
	Tauseef Ahmed	c Yadav b Shastri	10	75	62	1	0	16.12
	Saleem Jaffar	c Gavaskar b Maninder Singh	0	4	5	0	0	0.00
	Extras	(b 7, lb 8, nb 1)	16
	Total	(all out; 94.5 overs)	249	(2.62 runs per over)

Fall of wickets 1-45 (Javed Miandad), 2-57 (Rizwan-uz-Zaman), 3-89 (Rameez Raja), 4-121 (Saleem Malik), 5-142 (Iqbal Qasim), 6-166 (Manzoor Elahi), 7-184 (Wasim Akram), 8-198 (Imran Khan), 9-249 (Tauseef Ahmed), 10-249 (Saleem Jaffar)

	Bowling	O	M	R	W	Econ
	N Kapil Dev	12	2	25	1	2.08
	Maninder Singh	43.5	8	99	3	2.25
	RJ Shastri	24	3	69	4	2.87
	NS Yadav	15	3	41	2	2.73

	India 2nd innings (target: 221 runs)		R	M	B	4s	6s	SR
	SM Gavaskar	c Rizwan-uz-Zaman b Iqbal Qasim	96	320	264	8	0	36.36
	K Srikkanth	lbw b Wasim Akram	6	32	16	0	0	37.50
	M Amarnath	c †Saleem Yousuf b Wasim Akram	0	2	1	0	0	0.00
	DB Vengsarkar	b Tauseef Ahmed	19	75	66	1	0	28.78
	KS More†	lbw b Tauseef Ahmed	3	30	27	0	0	11.11
	M Azharuddin	c & b Iqbal Qasim	26	81	75	3	0	34.66
	RJ Shastri	c & b Iqbal Qasim	4	49	27	0	0	14.81
	N Kapil Dev*	b Iqbal Qasim	2	14	13	0	0	15.38
	RMH Binny	c †Saleem Yousuf b Tauseef Ahmed	15	61	48	0	1	31.25
	NS Yadav	b Tauseef Ahmed	4	8	10	1	0	40.00
	Maninder Singh	not out	2	20	16	0	0	12.50
	Extras	(b 22, lb 5)	27
	Total	(all out; 93.5 overs)	204	(2.17 runs per over)

Fall of wickets 1-15 (Srikkanth), 2-15 (Amarnath), 3-64 (Vengsarkar), 4-80 (More), 5-123 (Azharuddin), 6-155 (Shastri), 7-161 (Kapil Dev), 8-180 (Gavaskar), 9-185 (Yadav), 10-204 (Binny)

	Bowling	O	M	R	W	Econ
	Wasim Akram	11	3	19	2	1.72
	Iqbal Qasim	37	11	73	4	1.97
	Tauseef Ahmed	45.5	12	85	4	1.85

Match details

---

Toss - Pakistan, who chose to bat
Series - Pakistan won the 5-match series 1-0

Player of the match - SM Gavaskar (India)
Player of the series - Imran Khan (Pakistan)

Umpires - RB Gupta and VK Ramaswamy

Random Thoughts

Enemy Within

Mani Shankar Aiyer, of Congress Party goes to Pakistan and on a TV Channel makes a statement that Pakistan has to get rid of Modi and bring Congress back in power for the peace between two countries to be established. Asking an enemy country to support usurping the democratically elected Prime Minister of India, in my opinion amounts to treason and sedition. Why is Doval not arresting him and locking him up for good? Also a few days before that Salman Khurshid, another anti national, praises Pak PM and trashes our own. Congress has been quietly endorsing such activities. When I was with Hindustan Petroleum Corporation, I used to joke that my biggest competitor as a Sales Officer was my own people in the Supply Department, who will do their utmost to delay or not execute orders. When we have people like these, why do we need enemies?

 

Hypocrisy

When Terrorists attack third world countries and hundreds of lives are lost, the Western Countries calls for restraint in response, and gives only lip service to combating terrorism. When the same happens on their backyard, as it happened recently in France, or in England a few years back or in US a decade back, then it is a different ball game. Emergency is declared, war planes take off and purported terrorist hangouts are bombed to bits. There is no talk of restraint or such bullshit. A death is a death anywhere in the world. Assuming it is not, is sheer hypocrisy.

Idiots at BCCI

The mood of the people of the Country and the Government is anti Pakistan, except for a few bleeding heart stupids in the media and in public life. There is no way the Government would have allowed a Cricket Series between India and Pakistan, either in India or anywhere in the World. Then why oh why did BCCI began a dialogue with Pakistan regarding a Test Series, if it were to be played in India. This idiocy gave Pakistan to take the moral high ground, and refusing to play us, when all along they have been reduced to begging us to somehow play them. Pakistan Board is broke financially, and only a series with India will bring it some much wanted cash. When Pakistan has been identified as the root cause of terrorism, and when Duval is doing his best to  frustrate them by ignoring their tantrums and isolating them totally, the BCCI goes ahead and makes such a gaffe. I sincerely wish the PM or Duval would call Shashank Manohar and Anurag Thakur up, and give a public dressing down in Eden Gardens stadium watched by 100,000 people on the ground and millions on TV. They deserve nothing less

 

Oh for a Classical Wicket Keeper!

One of the saddest fall out of One Day and T 20 cricket is the demise of genuine classical Wicket Keepers. With teams opting to have batsmen who can be ball stoppers (I refuse to call them wicket

keepers) to don the gloves, there is no incentive for a youngster to work on his keeping ability. I have seen wonderful Keepers like Kirmani, Alan Knott, Bob Taylor, Sadanand Viswanath, Nayan Mongia behind the stumps and it is a pleasure to watch them take the balls with soft hands or effect a smart leg side take standing up. Their keeping to spinners was an art by itself. But the turn of the century saw the advent of the so called batsmen wicket keepers giving way later to batsmen stoppers. It is a tragedy that Sadanand Viswanath was lost to cricket due to personal reasons - he was a live wire and a class act. The match fixing scandal that put a cloud over Nayan Mongia was a big disappointment. He was superb standing up to spinners. Everyone hails Dhoni as one of the best. Perhaps yes as a Captain and a lower order batsmen. But his keeping was/ is atrocious. He gets up early, is not behind the stumps all the time to take the throw, has hard hands and never goes for the catch low in front of first slip. If anyone thinks that Uthappa or Ambati Rayudu should keep wicket for India, then they should have their head examined. Even the so called more proficient wicket keepers are found wanting in technique, be it Saha, Karthik, Parthiv or Sanju Samson. Perhaps the best wicket keepers in the world are Prasanna Jayawardhane of Srilanka and Dinesh Ramdhin of West Indies. And they both are not regulars. Sarfraz of Pakistan is adequate, at best.

Bharatha's of this world are priceless

Born with Gaja Kersari Yoga, I have always been or aimed to be the leader wherever I am. If I am not, it makes me very uneasy.

 

Naturally born leaders in the Ithihasas like Sri Rama became my heroes. However, Age has brought with it the much wanted wisdom, broader perspective and a fine tuning of the mindset which makes me appreciate the contribution of non leaders too.

 

There are many silent contributors in our epics, and in our work place who deserve much more respect and recognition than we give them. They do silently efficient work all the time, without being in the limelight, thereby allowing the leader to focus on other issues. They are the workhorses, who take considerable load and whose maintenance cost is very less. They run the Organization. The nurses in the hospital are one example.

 

Though I have been fascinated by Ramayana since childhood, somehow I had never given a second thought to the character of Bharatha, until recently that is.

 

Bharatha stayed under the radar, but his virtues are unparalleled. Perhaps his devotion to Sreerama is even more than that of Lakshmana.

 

On hearing that his mother has conspired to banish Sree Rama for 14 years, and thus giving him the Kingdom on a platter, he berates her no end and flatly refuses to accept the Throne, which rightfully belonged to his brother. It took lot of convincing from Sreerama to make him go back to Ayodhya, but only on the condition that he will rule as a Caretaker alone. He also eschewed all the comforts of the palace, and chose to live a simple life like his brother for the 14 years.

 

Bharatha was a brilliant and wise king. During his 14 years, the GDP of Ayodhya grew 10 times! Thus he ensured his brother got to rule a much richer, stronger and prosperous kingdom on his return from Vanavasa.

 

Once Sree Rama was back, he quietly slipped back to his role of supporting him in his duties, and to his credit, not even for a moment did he have any thoughts of wanting the Kingdom for himself.

 

If ever one wants an example for Nishkama Karma, he has to only look up Bharatha.

 

Though India's original name Bharatham has nothing to do with the Bharatha of Ramayana, it is a fitting tribute to him that, though inadvertently, we call our great country Bharatham

Straight ball on a Square Turner

One of India's famous Spin Quartet, Bishan Singh Bedi, once said that "On a Square Turning Pitch, the  most dangerous ball is the one that doesn't turn', which indirectly means 'don't get carried away by the prodigious turn that you are getting, but bowl the straight balls (or the arm balls in the case of Off Spinners and Left Arm Spinners or the Top Spinner in the case of Leg Spinners). more often. This is because the batsmen is expected to play for the huge turn, and can be caught napping if the ball goes straight through.

Ditto, on Seaming pitches, bowlers should not try to swing or seam much. Doing so might end up beating the bat very often, but all that will result in is a few oohs and aahs, but not regular wickets.

That Bedi was spot on is evident from the recently concluded Mohali Test, where more South African wickets fell to Straighter balls than to Viciously biting and turning ones.

This is true in other areas of life too. One tends to get carried away with success, and overdoes things which can backfire at a later stage.

Recently, I pulled off a  deal for my Company. I managed to close the deal with a major investor to set up a $ 11 Million New Company. Everyone expected me to have a major position in the new company, and it was a fait accompli. But I decided to walk away, satisfied that I have achieved what I set out to, and allowed others to run the Company. This caused considerable confusion, and panic amongst my colleagues and subordinates, who were baffled why I did what I did. They expected the big turning deliveries on a square turner but I bowled them a ball straight as an arrow.

Last heard, they were scratching their head. Let them for a while, till I explain to them why I did it.

Let us find out whether the award returnees have real balls!

Much has been written about the farce of the so called 'famous' writers and film makers returning their awards, citing lack of Freedom and rising intolerance in the Country, under BJP rule.

Though the social media has panned all these hypocrites, and exposed them for the charlatans they are, the Government has been muted in its response, except for some hard hitting speeches by Arun Jaitley and Venkaiah Naidu.

I was surprised to see Rajnath Singh asking these 'worthies' to engage in a dialogue with the Government! Pray why?

It is noteworthy that the Congress party which orchestrated this award return drama, did not bother to stand by them.

Why didn't Sonia or Rahul not return the Bharat Ratnas awarded to Nehru, Indira and Rahul? We would have gladly accepted them, for they were all unworthy of getting the highest honour of the nation, in any case.

How I wish the Government had called the bluff of these writers and film makers!

They should have given them one weeks time to return the Citation, the Cash award with interest accrued till date, the cost of translating and printing their books by Sahitya Academy in many languages, and the Royalty paid to them so far. If they refused to do so, then cases should be filed against them under IPC 420 for cheating the public.

Now, THAT would have set the cat amongst the pigeons and we would have found out how many of these commie left pseudo liberals have real balls!

Good bye, my friend!

I am very sentimental, and am attached to personal belongings that have been with me for a long time, especially if they were with me during my difficult times.

I hang on to slippers and shoes till they are worn out, no matter whether I have couple of brand new ones already purchased and used sparingly.

Ditto with my tennis racquet or pen.

I hate to change my car, unless absolutely required nor house. There is a comfort in reaching out for something with which you are very comfortable.

It doesn't mean that I don't embrace newer things. Quite the contrary. It is just that I like to surround myself  or wear things which are comfortable.

It is why I was extremely sad when my old iphone ( I don't even remember the version - I think it is iphone 4), purchased in August 2011 finally decided that it has had enough of me and decided to malfunction. I have been urged by all around me to change to a newer version even 2 years ago, but I resisted. And this in an era where people change mobiles every 6 months!!

My IT supplier, who knows my habits, jokingly told me to go for iphone 6s, while light heatedly passing a remark "better take it, as it is the best bet to last ANOTHER 4 years!!"

So with a heavy heart, I have to bid good bye to a dear friend. You have been with me through times good and bad, and have been very reliable. On my part, I have treated you with respect, and even today, after 4 years and 3 months, you look as good as new. If only your power switch didn't malfunction!! Sigh!