Sunil Gavaskar: The Pole Star Of Indian Cricket

One of India's legendary cricketers and former captain Sunil Gavaskar celebrates his 74th birthday today. known affectionately as 'Sunny' and 'Little Master'. Gavaskars extraordinary career is characterized by breaking and setting numerous batting records, which included the era of west indies fearful bowling attack, that is still consider the fiercest ever.

 

 

 

 

Gavaskar was a very successful and accomplished batsman during his playing career, and many experts consider him to be one of the greatest batsmen of his era. One of the things that set him apart from other players of his time was his technical proficiency and his ability to play well against both fast and spin bowling. He was also known for his ability to score runs consistently and his ability to score runs in all conditions, which made him a very difficult player to bowl to.

 

Additionally, Gavaskar was known for his mental toughness and his ability to stay focused and composed under pressure, which helped him to perform well in high-stakes situations. Overall, Gavaskar's combination of technical skill, consistency, and mental fortitude made him a unique and highly successful batsman. To understand how high Gavaskar's technical skill in cricket was, I quote one example or incident here, this anecdote is from the year 1996.

 

The Singer Cup tournament was going on in Singapore and the India vs Pakistan match was going on. But in this match Pakistani batsman Inzamam ul Haq was not able to hit the runs properly. The match was stopped due to rain interruption. And Inzamam came to meet Gavaskar in the commentary box, and ask him to help for resolve his problem. The conversation that took place in the commentary box of Singapore at this time shows how high-quality Gavaskar's technical skills in cricket were. The conversation between the two of them was something like this;

 

 

Hearing this observation made by Sunil Gavaskar from the commentary box, Inzamam-ul-Haq was left to literally fall at Gavaskar's feet. From above incidence we can realize how technically skilled Gavaskar was. A little man from Mumbai with the most unlikely stature dug in against the deadliest of bowlers to hold the fort for India during those days. We are talking about the original little master, Sunil Manohar Gavaskar. He was the first to get 10,000 Test runs and 34 centuries. But his greatness lied beyond numbers.

 

Be it bowling quality, protective equipment, pitches, rules, everything was there to put batsmen on a knife’s edge. Opening the batting on uncovered pitches was very difficult as the ball swung like a boomerang. As the pitches were left uncovered during the night, a lot of dew was collected on the pitch and it was like batting on the first day fresh pitch each morning. So, it had a lot of spice and roadblocks for batsmen.

 

In modern-day cricket, there is protective gear for almost each and every body part. Back in those days, there weren’t even proper helmets. Nowadays, advanced head protection has wiped out fear of bouncers out of batsman’s heart. Someone like Gavaskar had to wear caps/scarves to protect his head, which wasn’t quite effective in preventing head injuries.

 

 

 

 

 

Due to lack of helmets unlike in Sachin’s era or these days – many batsmen were smashed in their skull, some had broken jaws, while some lost consciousness because of the thunderous impact with the ball. Also, there was a lack of proper padding in most of the protective gears. The bats weren’t also as huge. In those times, the middle of the lower half of the bat was the sweet spot, unlike today when there are many sweet spots. The bats have evolved a great deal with time.

 

Once Garry Sobers, who is considered to be the greatest all-rounder remarked “Gavaskar rated the greatest because of the bowling attacks that he came up against. At that time West Indies had a fast bowling attack that was unplayable; they had bowlers who used to bowl out teams in three days. Gavaskar played against those bowlers and he made a lot of runs. People make always make a lot of runs in their own country, under their own conditions, but if you look at Gavaskar’s record, he made a lot of runs away from India; he made a lot of runs in England, a lot in the West Indies and Australia.

 

He certainly came up as an opening batsman against the best of attacks like Michael Holding, JoelGarner, Colin Croft; you call them and he played against them.” Gavaskar is also a big figure in Indian cricket as he inspired a generation that also includes Sachin Tendulkar with his bull-headed confidence. He injected self-belief in the team that had low self-esteem. Indian batsmen were considered too meek to do well against hostile pacers. Things eased up for batsman with time. But Gavaskar had it the hard way. The fact that he was the first great batsman from the country also makes his contribution a whole lot more special. No doubt that Sachin and Kohli have been great, but there would be no one quite like Sunil Manohar Gavaskar.

 

Gavaskar was the first sportsperson that India had produced who had the confidence, patience, tenacity and technical capability to dominate the rest of the world in their own domain. In a sense, he was the first person to break the shackles of a post-colonial inferiority complex that afflicted many of India's early sportspersons. It was once said of Gavaskar that he played cricket as if he were an Englishman, born and brought up in the home of cricket.

 

His temperament and technical excellence supposedly belied the dusty maidans of Mumbai's Shivaji Park, where he spent his formative cricketing years. It is another matter that Gavaskar, who has little patience for anything smacking of Anglo-Australian condescension in the cricket world, would not be flattered by such accolades. As an opener he was in the firing line from the start and performed remarkably consistently on different types of wicket and against different types of bowling.

 

While India can claim greatness in the bastmanship of Vijay Merchant and Vinoo Mankad prior to Gavaskar, it has not since produced another Test opener with a fraction of Gavaskar's capability. The dearth of quality openers has been a bane of Indian Test cricket. Few other Indian players, openers or otherwise, can boast of Gavaskar's concentration skills, discipline, tenacity, patience and confidence. He was a professional in every sense of the word. Certainly no other Indian has possessed his technical ability.

 

 

Finally, I will end this article with a small anecdote, the afternoon of 16th March 2012 in Bangladesh, and the India vs Bangladesh match was going on at the Mirpur Stadium. This match was going to be a golden page not only for India but in the history of world cricket. Sachin Tendulkar, a cricket legend, scored his Centurie's century in this match.

 

Sachin had broken Sunil Gavaskar's record. And a great history was made. But an even more unforgettable moment was then experienced by the whole world. As soon as Sunil Gavaskar came to the field to greet Sachin and took him in his arms, he proved that he is not only a cricketing legend, but also a Great human being.

 

 

 

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