I always refer to the Indian spin triumvirate of the sixties and seventies, and smile to myself whenever anyone talks about a quartet.
The same as I used to smile to myself whenever an Indian talked about Erapalli Prasanna being dropped for Srinivas Venkataraghavan. I also thought, “I hope he has some influence in selection.” There was no comparison between Prasanna and Venkat as bowlers. Pras was the best opposition spin bowler I played against; he was seeking your wicket every ball he bowled and you knew you were locked in a serious mental battle each time you faced him.
His flight was impeccable. There were many times when I left my crease, certain that I was going to get to his flighted delivery at least on the half volley. It never happened: my estimated time of arrival never coincided with Pras’ appointed destination.
Years after our many on-field battles I organised a meeting between Pras and Australian off-spinner Gavin Robertson. During the meeting Pras said to the ever-eager Robertson; “Gavin, it’s not an invitation to be hit into the grandstand. It’s a request to be lofted into the outfield.” That was how Prasanna thought about flight, “The higher up the bat you hit, the more loft on the shot and the less distance it will travel.”
Prasanna was an engineer by trade and he applied that the same sort of thinking to his bowling. I met him at a friend’s barbecue party when he was living in Sydney many years ago and we talked about spin bowling for about twenty minutes. At the end of the discussion, I said to him, “Now I know why I had so much trouble playing you.”
It was a fascinating discussion on India’s great spin bowler sand one that any budding young spinner should have the privilege of hearing.
After I had got to know Pras better during our playing days, I said to him over a dressing room beer, “You’ve got a string tied to that ball and just as I’m about to get to the pitch of the delivery, you tug on the string.” He just laughed and then smiled knowingly.
It was one of the great joys of my cricketing life to do battle with Erapalli Prasanna.
The difference between Bishan (Bish) Bedi and Prasanna in India was the former often resorted to trying to bore you out while the latter always attempted to bowl you out. Bish would often place a strong off-side field and bowl at off-stump turning away, making it difficult to score. I felt there were times when he resorted to this ploy too quickly.
When I faced him in Australia during the World X1 series he attacked more and used flight cleverly. At the SCG he bowled me with a beautifully flighted delivery that I thought I had covered all the way and was in the process of driving wide off mid-on. It drifted late and I completely missed it. When years later I heard the great Australian leg-spinner Bill ‘Tiger’ O’Reilly talk about the “right-hand batsman’s blind spot,” I immediately cast my mind back to that delivery from Bish.
Whenever Bedi and I met these days I greet him with “It was an arm ball, Bish.” He immediately laughs and wags his finger, “No, no Ian, it was the one that spins from leg to off.” This is a response to Bish getting me out for 99 in Calcutta [now Kolkata] in the fourth Test of 1969-70. To this day I’m convinced it was an arm-ball that I was looking to turn into the leg-side for a single to reach my century. However, it turned ever so slightly, found the edge and I was caught at first slip.
It was always a great battle facing India’s great spin bowlers especially the duo of Prasanna and Bedi and you couldn’t afford to ‘switch off’ even for one delivery.
In the 1969-70 series between India and Australia, Bhagwat Chandrasekhar didn’t play any of the Tests. I always thought that was a selection blunder and was perhaps the result of him having a poor tour of Australia in 1967-68. There’s no doubt Chandra was easier to cope with in Australia on pitches that were more even in bounce. His most difficult delivery to cope was the wrong-un which used to bounce quite steeply in Australia. There was always the danger of being caught in the leg-trap.
On Indian pitches which were more uneven in bounce he would’ve been a handful. I can image him on the less-than-true surfaces of Delhi and Madras [now Chennai] being a real handful but luckily for us the selectors seemed to prefer the all-round capabilities of Venkat.
The other important aspect of the India’s great spin bowlers: Pras Bish and Chandra was the captaincy of M A K (Tiger) Pataudi. ‘Tiger’ understood spin bowling and he knew the individual bowlers well and got the best out of them.
The combination of threatening spin bowlers well captained, made batting a challenge, but one that I enjoyed greatly.
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